In March 2006, Abdul Rahman of Afghanistan was imprisoned, very nearly sentenced to death, and finally forced to flee his country. His crime? Converting from Islam to Christianity. The judge trying his case told reporters, "It is illegal to be a Christian and it should be punished."

 Such religious persecution is unheard of in America, where the First Amendment prohibits the government from making any law "respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." This clause has been called the First Freedom, not only because of its appropriate location at the very beginning of the Bill of Rights, but also because religious beliefs are so foundational, such an integral part of a person. Without liberty of conscience, Patrick Henry declared, we would be "in a state of servility…of perpetual bondage." This is still true more than two centuries later, as Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice understood when she said, "There is no more fundamental issue for the U.S. than freedom of religion. This country was founded on that basis and it is at the heart of democracy." Although the United States was the first nation to guarantee freedom of religion to its citizens, it took many years to arrive at this point. Before protecting this fundamental liberty, the colonists first had to recognize religious freedom as an essential element of democracy. Then they needed to resolve the issue of how best to protect this freedom.

 The concept of religious liberty has been closely connected with our nation ever since the founding of the first colonies almost four hundred years ago. In 1620 the "Pilgrims" came to Plymouth Plantation to escape religious persecution. For the same reason Puritans established a colony at Massachusetts Bay, Quakers settled in Pennsylvania, and Catholics found homes in Maryland. Meanwhile, intense religious persecution continued in Europe. In 1685 Louis XIV revoked the political rights of the Huguenots, or French Protestants, destroying their churches and closing their schools. During the same decade, the "Killing Times" in Scotland claimed the lives of thousands of Covenanters. In 1731 Austria expelled 20,000 Lutherans from the city of Salzburg.

 In the seventeenth century, Europe began to witness calls for reform. The Puritan poet John Milton urged his countrymen to support religious liberty in a treatise "Shewing That it is Not Lawfull for any Power on Earth to Compell in Matters of Religion." John Locke developed the theory of natural rights and took up the cause of religious freedom in "A Letter Concerning Toleration." Voltaire, Montesquieu, and other Enlightenment writers also advocated complete religious toleration.

 These demands for greater religious freedom spread quickly to the colonies. The colonial governments were remarkably tolerant for their time, and their establishments of religion were not nearly as strict as those in Europe (Lambert, The Founding Fathers and the Place of Religion in America, 180). Some colonies, such as Virginia, had an official church but tolerated other denominations. Others, such as New Hampshire, had "multiple establishments" with several denominations receiving government support. Rhode Island provided complete freedom of worship from the beginning. Its charter granted all residents "the free exercise and enjoyment of their civil and religious rights." In 1649 Maryland's government drew up a Toleration Act that allowed "free exercise of religion" to both Protestants and Catholics.

 By the time of the Great Awakening in eighteenth-century America, "New Lights" were insisting that religion was a personal matter in which the state should not interfere. British attempts to extend the power and influence of the Anglican Church in the colonies led Americans to associate government establishments of religion with tyranny. The colonists resisted Anglican efforts to convince the king to appoint a resident bishop for America (Lambert, The Founding Fathers, 195). Economic grievances and political injustice had already bred discontent. These religious maneuvers further embittered the colonists toward their mother country. Many of America's ardent patriots called for religious liberty, including Sam Adams, Patrick Henry, and Thomas Jefferson.

 After the American Revolution began, New York, New Jersey, Delaware, and Pennsylvania removed all traces of government involvement in religion (Levy, Origins of the Bill of Rights, 97). In 1776 Virginia adopted a Declaration of Rights, drafted by George Mason, which stated that "all men are equally entitled to the free exercise of religion," for religious beliefs "can be directed only by reason and conviction, and not by force or violence." The other colonies soon drafted similar bills of rights. James Madison's famous "Memorial and Remonstrance Against Religious Assessments" called freedom of conscience "an unalienable right" and helped defeat a proposal in the Virginia legislature to establish a tax for the support of churches. Soon afterwards Virginia adopted a Statute for Religious Freedom, written by Thomas Jefferson, which made this liberty even more secure.

 The majority of the delegates to the 1787 Constitutional Convention were convinced that freedom of religion was a fundamental right. However, the federalists had their doubts about whether it should be mentioned in the Constitution. James Wilson of Pennsylvania explained that the national government could only exercise certain enumerated powers. Since the Constitution did not give it the power to interfere with religious freedom, why did this right need to be more explicitly protected? In Federalist No. 84, Alexander Hamilton argued that a bill of rights was not only unnecessary but could be dangerous, since it might "afford a colorable pretext to claim more [powers] than were granted." Furthermore, James Madison pointed out that it would be impossible to compile an exhaustive list of rights.

 In contrast, the anti-federalists favored a bill of rights. They were suspicious of a strong national government, fearing that it would find ways to hinder fundamental rights such as freedom of religion. It could, for instance, take advantage of the "necessary and proper" clause of the Constitution. A list of rights would be a valuable tool for restricting such abuses of power. It might not be perfect but, as Thomas Jefferson said, "Half a loaf is better than no bread. If we cannot secure all our rights, let us secure what we can."

 Initially, the federalists won the debate and omitted a bill of rights. However, this turned out to be a mistake. George Mason refused to sign it, objecting that "there is no Declaration of Rights." Opposition was strong in every state. Virginia, North Carolina, New Hampshire and New York proposed amendments to protect religious freedom. To secure ratification, the federalists had to promise to add a list of rights.

When the members of Congress finally began to draft the Bill of Rights in 1789, they could not agree on how best to phrase the amendment on religious freedom. After Madison's original draft was rejected, Samuel Livermore of New Hampshire suggested that the amendment should read, "Congress shall make no laws touching religion, or infringing the rights of conscience." Because the House thought something specific should be said about establishments of religion, it eventually accepted a version proposed by Fisher Ames of Massachusetts: "Congress shall make no law establishing religion, or to prevent the free exercise thereof, or to infringe the rights of conscience." Meanwhile, the Senate rejected a proposal to prevent the establishment of "one religious sect or society in preference to others" on the basis that the amendment should be stricter and prohibit the government from interfering in religion altogether. It then accepted the House version but later changed it to "Congress shall make no law establishing articles of faith or a mode of worship, or prohibiting the free exercise of religion." This version seemed too narrow to the House, which refused to accept it. Finally a joint conference committee arrived at the First Amendment as we know it today.

 Because the Senate debates were conducted in secrecy, the intent of Congress is not always clear (Levy, Establishment Clause, 81). But one thing is certain. The grouping of freedom of religion with freedom of speech, press and assembly was no accident. These freedoms all deal with the right to express oneself without government coercion and reflect the American belief that the individual takes priority over the government (Urofsky, The Roots of Religious Liberty).

 The adoption of the Bill of Rights in 1791 did not bring an end to controversy concerning religious freedom. When Washington and Adams instituted days of thanksgiving and prayer, tax exemptions for church property, and the appointment of chaplains for Congress and the army, Madison disapproved. Although he believed it was "proper that public functionaries, as well as their Constituents, should discharge their religious duties," they should do so privately and "at their own expense." Jefferson agreed. As he wrote to the Danbury Baptists, the First Amendment had erected a "wall of separation between church and state."

 But how strong and high was this wall intended to be? Controversy over this issue continues even today. Can creationism be taught in public schools? Should prayer at football games and graduation ceremonies be permitted? Is it unconstitutional to display the Ten Commandments on government property? However, despite the heated disputes these issues engender, they seem almost insignificant when compared with the religious wars and cruel persecutions in many parts of the world. In America the right to worship freely is no far-off ideal but a reality. It is our First Freedom, anchored securely in the First Amendment to the Constitution.