October 14, 2003

On October 1, Dr. Alan Keyes addressed a group of over 2,000 patriotic Christians and pastors in Lufkin, Texas. The speech was carried on KIBN TV and webcast live by the City of Lufkin. (The webcast is still available.)

In this outstanding speech, Dr. Keyes shared a number of personal insights in the national debate over church-state separation, in an effort to educate Americans about their religious liberties. Among the points made by Dr. Keyes are the following, in his words:

The right to publicly acknowledge God

I believe deeply that, as a nation, we stand as it were looking over into the deep abyss of our own destruction. Hard words to hear, but they ought to be easy words to understand, and I know a couple of years ago we understood them well enough. . . .

Our children no longer have the right to pray to Him in the schools. Our leaders no longer have the right to invoke His name from the public platform in their speeches. And this, despite the fact that when you turn the pages back to the very beginning of our nation's life, what do we find right there inscribed on the foundation-stone of this nation's existence, in the very first words that were spoken by us as a people, was an acknowledgment of His will and His power as the very source from which we obtain our rights.

How can a nation that was founded on the belief that we are all created equal and endowed by our Creator--not by our courts, and not by our Constitution, and not by the Bill of Rights, and not by any president, and not by any legislatures, and not by any judges, but by God Almighty, [by whom] we are endowed with our rights--

How can a nation, founded upon such a principle, how can a nation that derives its liberty, that derives its sense of justice from such an acknowledgment of God--how can we have come to a day when we will submit to those who tell us that as citizens, as free men and women, we have not the right to acknowledge God in our public lives? . . .

The courts, as we have seen in many episodes, and especially as we saw in the events that drew many of us to Montgomery, the courts have intervened in America's life in order to establish a venue where anybody in our public life--any politician, any public figure, anybody at all who dares to bring forward an acknowledgment of God in the public place--is being struck down and rebuked by them and told that this cannot be done. It's a "violation," they say.

A national movement to take back our God-given rights

We're going to try to gather people in towns and hamlets and counties and cities all over, so that to a man, people of conscience will be standing all over America, and when they tell us not to pray, and when they tell us not to invoke His name, we will just say no! . . .

The nature of American law

And there are those, as I was saying, among my friends, people I know--fellow conservatives, as well as folks who are not--who are characterizing what I've just said and what Roy Moore has done as "law-breaking," as "showing disrespect for law." Have you read about this? Have you seen this?

And here's where I have a problem, and where it is going to require that we think this through together for a minute. Because, we're Americans, right? And we live in a country where the great Declaration of Independence declared it as the principle of all American government--which is to say, all legitimate and just law--that such law must be based upon the consent of the people. We do remember that, don't we?

In other words, if somebody just happens to gain power by military means or superior force, or guile and fraud, and then turns around and start ordering everybody about because they've got power, does that power justify their will? No, it does not. Because, according to the first principle of our freedom, no government can be legitimate, and no law is in fact just, if it is not derived from the consent of the governed.

Now, how do you do that? Well, in our society, it's pretty simple. We have a system of government in which there are two basic sources of law derived from the consent of the people. The first is our constitutions, which have been made in our states and at the national level by people who gathered together in conventions, chosen by the people to represent them, and they were then, in most cases, directly ratified by a vote of the people.

And then, pursuant to those constitutions, we elect and establish governments with legislatures, and in those legislatures sit people who are elected by the people and who therefore represent their consent, and they make our laws. And if the law is not in the constitutions, and if the law is not derived from the work of those legislatures, then it is no law.

And this is where I have a problem, because when the federal judge says to Roy Moore, "You're in violation," first question we need to ask is, "In violation of what law? What law?" And he's a federal judge, so it would have to be federal law, I think. Because, see, he's not a state judge. He's not dealing with state law. We have to find a federal law that somehow says that Roy Moore and anybody else in this country can't put the Ten Commandments in the Supreme Judicial Building, can't put the Ten Commandments on the wall of a courthouse.

Where is this law? Well, I have news for you. You can go through all the federal statutes you want anywhere in this country, and you are not going to find it.

The word "respecting" in the Establishment Clause

By and large, the ACLU and all the people on the Left and all these folks on the federal bench, they act as if that word "respecting" isn't there [in the First Amendment]. They read those first words as if they say, "Congress shall make no law establishing a religion," and you see, that's not what the First Amendment says. But, under the rubric of reading it as if that's what's there, they have acted as if what that says is that Congress can't establish by law any religion, impose by law any religion. But that's not exactly what it says. Read it:

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion."

What does "respecting" mean? Well, you go to the dictionary, you look it up, and respecting means concerning, regarding, having to do with, dealing with. Hmm. That's very interesting. . . .

And you know what's interesting? Those words of the First Amendment, "Congress shall make no law" concerning, dealing with, having to do with, in regard to "an establishment of religion," they have the same significance. Those words tell the Congress of the United States that this is a subject they are not to touch, they're not to get involved with it, they're not by law to put their hands on it.

[Now] if Congress can't make a law on this subject in any way--see, they can't make a law establishing a religion, but by the same token, if they can't touch it at all, if there happens to be an established religion somewhere in America (as there were in almost all of the original states of the United States, just, by the by, at the time that the amendment was passed)--this also means Congress can't touch them, Congress can't change them, Congress can't make decisions with "respect" to those things.

And here's where I have the problem. In one way it's a problem, in another way it alleviates the problem. It's a problem because when somebody says that you're in violation if you put the Ten Commandments in your courthouse, you read the words of the First Amendment, and you realize, wait a minute. This Federal judge derives his or her authority from two sources: either the laws of the United States, or the Constitution of the United States. Now, in the Constitution we read these words, and the effect of these words is that there can be no federal laws on this subject.

Therefore, if a judge says you've got to take it out, it can't be based on the law--because there are no laws! There can be no laws at the federal level! None! It's forbidden by the Constitution!

The Tenth Amendment

And, as if it couldn't be any clearer, if you didn't understand the implications of the First Amendment (and the Founders knew that there would be some people who might not, or in the course of our history would forget), just in case you might have been confused about what its effect was, they put in the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution. And the Tenth Amendment says very clear words that are not at all hard to understand, that any power that is not delegated to the United States by the Constitution or prohibited by it to the states is reserved to the states respectively and to the people. Isn't that amazing? Those are powerful words.

Judicial theft

If the Constitution says that the power to deal with the issue of religious establishment is reserved to the states respectively and to the people, you tell me how that power has ended up in the hands of the federal judiciary. Where did they get it? How did they come by it? There is only one way! They stole it from us! . . .

And what have they done with it?

Well, since they got their hands on it, by fraud and theft, they have used it to drive God from our public schools. With the consequence what? A rising tide of crime, and violence, and drugs, and un-discipline, and poor performance in those very schools from which they have driven the name of God.

They have used it to say that even in our games and festivities we cannot invoke the name of God. That even before they play, they cannot pray to God Almighty, with what consequence? That even our sports are not spared the scourge of corruption that afflicts our nation far and wide. What have they done with this power?

They have sought to drive, from every precinct of our public and political life, any reference to God or to His law. With what consequence, but the corruption and the lawlessness of politicians, and of business people, that besets us day by day, and year by year, until we no longer know whether the land in which we live has any integrity.

And every one of these trends, documented time and again, began to take off steeply once they had stolen this power and used it to drive God from our schools and our public lives. Even if we were not disposed simply on grounds of Constitutional integrity, to call them to account for this fraudulent theft, then, on the grounds of our children, dead and in despair; on the grounds of our schools, destroyed and in moral ruins; on the grounds of our businesses, despoiled of their integrity; on all these grounds, we must stand now and take back what they have stolen!

Law and lawlessness

When the judge is interpreting the law and his decision is made on the basis of that law, or when the judge is interpreting the Constitution and his decision is made on the basis of that Constitution, then the judge acts lawfully and his word is law. When the judge, however, acts in disregard of the clear plain language of the Constitution and usurps to his personal use of power that belongs to the states and the people of the United States, when that judge acts according to his personal whim, that judge acts according to his lawless will and his word is not only, not law, it is the lawless destruction of law and order in our land.

Time and again, our Founders said that they had established a government of laws and not of men, but if the mere fact that a black-robed judge says it, without any regard to law or Constitution, is now to constitute for us law, then we no longer have a Republic. We no longer have liberty. We have a dictatorship of the judges and we are free men and women no more!

Article IV, Section IV, of the Constitution says that the United States--that is, the national federal government--shall guarantee to each of the states a republican form of government. See?

That means a government based upon consent; a government of the people, by the people, and for the people. If the Federal judges are now substituting a dictatorship of the judges, then they place the national government in violation of that fundamental provision. They subvert the form of government which that Constitution has established, and they bring us to the point where we face now, or in the future, the prospect of its dissolution. There can be nothing graver than the crisis that they have bought on this land!

The Founders' remedy

Foreseeing the problem, [the Founders] provided the remedy. And what is the remedy? Well, the remedy is very clear, in Constitutional terms, because right there in the article that establishes the federal judiciary, they say that that judiciary shall have original jurisdiction in these and these cases, and appellate jurisdiction in all other cases arising out of the Constitution and laws of the United States, with such exceptions and under such regulation as the Congress shall make. Think about that.

According to our Constitution, the only thing that's law is what the legislature says it is. That's right. See? But, no, they don't want us to remember that. But, frankly, our Founders remembered what it means to be governed by consent and they allowed as how, if the judges start to steal powers that don't belong to them, if they cross over the boundaries that separate their judicial power from the law-making power that is in the hands of the representatives of the people, then the representatives of the people can stand up and take that power away from them!

Legislating morality

I don't think it's an accident that the ACLU has put on the big push to pretend that you can't honor the Ten Commandments in the courts and in the laws. You know why? I think it's very simple, because they want to intimidate us with the belief that it's somehow illegitimate to apply the fruits of our faith in our moral convictions to our laws. It appalls me sometimes how far they have succeed at that already. They have succeeded at making the people believe that "you can't legislate morality." A more nonsensical statement I have never heard in my life.

Every element of the criminal code involves the legislation of morality. Every element of the welfare system involves the legislation of morality. Every element of the civil code that guarantees that there shall be good faith in contract, in respect for property, is the legislation of morality. All you do in a society is legislate morality.

So, how have they gotten away with telling us this lie? Well, they know, good and well, that you must legislate morality, but what they're really saying is, "We're not going to allow you to legislate Christian morality. We're not going to allow you to legislate Biblical morality. We're going to tell you the lie that you must separate church and state. You must separate God from country. You must separate faith from law, so that we can drive from this nation all those things that depend upon the insights and truths that have come to us through the revelation of God."

Faith and public policy

The Founders understood you can't separate faith from policy, faith from law, faith from politics. You can't.

At the end of the day, there is no grounds for conviction in a moral people if they must check their reverence for God at the door of public life. If we wish to save these vital institutions, if we wish to restore the integrity of the moral fabric of our land, then I believe that our first step has got to be to end, once and for all, the lie that we are constitutionally obliged to separate church from state, God from our country. There is no such constitutional provision. The constitutional provision that is there gives us the explicit right to act on our religious conscience as a people, in and through our public institutions in our states.

Join hands with others in a "mighty national movement"

It is my prayer tonight that we will become part of a mighty national movement in which we shall join hands together in His name and with respect for His law, in order to bring them out of the darkness and confusion of this lying fraud in our courts, and back into the light and liberty of our willing heart as a people.

If we are, in fact, ready to do this, to act with understanding, and to act with conviction, and to act despite all the false arguments of lawlessness that are brought against us, then I have felt in the past few weeks a sense of hope for this country that I haven't felt in a long time.

See the full transcript.

See:

• "Webcast of Keyes' Lufkin, Texas, speech still available" (Oct. 7).

• "Keyes' Texas speech to be webcast live tonight" (Oct. 1).

• "Alan Keyes to speak Wednesday at Texas rally" (Sept. 29).