The Conscience of the State in North America

Abstract

This book strongly challenges the commonly held view that Great Britain, Canada and the United States are dissimilate in one important aspect of their histories - the relations between Church and state, between religious opinion and public life. In this comparative study, Dr Norman traces the movements towards the formal separation of Church and state since the mid-eighteenth century. He demonstrates that the redefinition of their mutual relationships has followed an essentially similar, though independent and chronologically uneven, course in all three countries. Viewed from the perspectives of British experience, North American problems and their solutions are shown to conform to a recognisably similar pattern. Dr Norman outlines the common elements making for change: the combined forces of religious pluralism which undermined the strength of the established Churches, allied with radical politicians who demanded the end of state protection of religious institutions in the name of political justice.