The writings of James Madison, comprising his public papers and his private correspondence, including numerous letters and documents now for the first time printed. |
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VETO MESSAGES. |
 | The writings of James Madison, |  |
VETO MESSAGES.
To the House of Representatives of the United States:
Having examined and considered the bill entitled "An
Act incorporating the Protestant Episcopal Church in the
town of Alexandria, in the District of Columbia," I now return
the bill to the House of Representatives, in which it originated,
with the following objections:
Because the bill exceeds the rightful authority to which
governments are limited by the essential distinction between
civil and religious functions, and violates in particular the
article of the Constitution of the United States which declares
that "Congress shall make no law respecting a religious establishment."
The bill enacts into and establishes by law sundry
rules and proceedings relative purely to the organization and
polity of the church incorporated, and comprehending even
the election and removal of the minister of the same, so that
no change could be made therein by the particular society or
by the general church of which it is a member, and whose
authority it recognizes. This particular church, therefore,
would so far be a religious establishment by law, a legal force
and sanction being given to certain articles in its constitution
and administration. Nor can it be considered that the articles
thus established are to be taken as the descriptive criteria
only of the corporate identity of the society, inasmuch as this
identity must depend on other characteristics, as the regulations
established are generally unessential and alterable
according to the principles and canons by which churches of
that denomination govern themselves, and as the injunctions
and prohibitions contained in the regulations would be enforced
by the penal consequences applicable to a violation
of them according to the local law.
Because the bill vests in the said incorporated church an
authority to provide for the support of the poor and the education
of poor children of the same, an authority which, being
pious charity, would be a precedent for giving to religious
societies as such a legal agency in carrying into effect a public
and civil duty.
February 28, 1811.
To the House of Representatives of the United States:
Having examined and considered the bill entitled "An act
for the relief of Richard Tervin, William Coleman, Edwin
Lewis, Samuel Mims, Joseph Wilson, and the Baptist Church
at Salem Meeting House, in the Mississippi Territory," I now
return the same to the House of Representatives, in which it
originated, with the following objection:
Because the bill in reserving a certain parcel of land of the
United States for the use of said Baptist Church comprises a
principle and precedent for the appropriation of funds of the
United States for the use and support of religious societies,
contrary to the article of the Constitution which declares
that "Congress shall make no law respecting a religious
establishment."
| The writings of James Madison, | |