Examining an issue that has been a matter of controversy since the founding of the United States, "Separation of Church and State" offers a chronological survey that helps put the ongoing debate in broad historical context.

The book briefly traces the earliest instances of tension between church and state within the Western tradition, from the era of Constantine to the Reformation, before moving on to the American experience. Attention is paid to the colonial debates about the ideal relationship between faith and politics, the 18th-century trends that culminated in a constitutional...