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Keep government out of the bedroom

EDITOR:

Commissioner Isbel is proposing that Anderson County become a “Sanctuary for the Unborn.”

The issue isn’t abortion. It is keeping church separate from state.

The good commissioner is asking for government overreach in the name of personal beliefs. Commendable as they might be, they have nothing to do with running county government.

The First Amendment has been interpreted as protecting religions from government interference. Jefferson and Madison also worried about the opposite, arguing that forcing taxpayers to follow a particular religion violated religious liberty. Baptists, Presbyterians, Quakers, and Anglicans supported them. They knew bad things happened when they weren’t separated — lions’ dens, Inquisitions, witch burnings, that kind of thing. And Taliban practices offer a modern and extreme example if current events, not history, is your thing.

Let’s keep government out of the bedroom.

Leave personal matters to families, individuals, and their pastors, counselors, and doctors. No one can talk to God for us, certainly not government. The Almighty loses nothing by keeping church and state separate. In fact, the Almighty can do pretty well without churches, having existed well before brick and mortar was raised in honor and the towers of doctrine that keep many employed.

Let’s relax and get on with the proper business of governing the county — safety, education, jobs, roads, trash, recreation, culture, sports, tourism, zoning, codes.

Let’s celebrate all life — the born and the unborn — as our consciences direct us, not the government, and not by dog-whistle slogans that mean nothing in practical, definable, civic terms.

Mary Knepper

Anderson County