Ruling: No Separation of Church and State?

And it's not how the Constitution was interpreted for 150 years. Sorry but if this true, the judge is right. There is no "separation clause" in the Constitution. It is indeed an "extra-constitutional construct" that has outlived it's usefulness.The question should be whether any law has been passed respecting an establishment of religion. If no law has been passed, then it's Constitutional.

The term "wall of separation" was a Baptist term with a specific historical meaning at the time, and completely different than the concept of separation today. Regardless, it's not in the Constitution. If it was enforced behaviour with penalties, it is a de facto law. Now, putting up displays, Christian or Moslem or whatever, is not a de facto law.Capische?

Wrong Holmes. You are the one lying here. He was writing to the Danbury Baptists, and thus using their term. It's like the term pro-life. Pretty much everyone knows the term pro-life means anti-abortion, right? Some may argue it means anti-death penalty, and some pro-lifers are anti-death penalty, but that's not what the term means. Most pro-lifers are not necessarily against the death penalty.So 200 years from now, someone reading a letter written to Dr Dobson claiming the Constitution is fully in accordance with his concerns and is "pro-life" should not refer to whatever "pro-life" means 200 years from now, but what it means today, and today it means anti-abortion.You are reading a modernist interpretation of the term separation of Church and State back into history, and you are wrong. I am sorry that you cannot come to grips with historical reality, but it's not my fault that you cannot. The term "separation of Church and State" stems straight out of Anabaptism, not the Enlightenment.

It's quite clear that the term separation of Church and State stems from the Anabaptists and indeed is qualitatively different than the pro-secularist positiuon you advance.

"Respecting" simply means "concerning." It has nothing to do with respect. Congress is just forbidden from regulating religion. That's all.