Justin's Political Corner

President Obama echoed the sentiments of the essential founder of the American experiment in his response to Sunday’s horrific killings at the Sikh Temple of Wisconsin.

“As we mourn this loss which took place at a house of worship,” said Obama, “we are reminded how much our country has been enriched by Sikhs, who are a part of our broader American family.”

That notion of the Sikh community as “part of our broad American family” is not a new one. Sikhs have been a part of the American religious fabric for the better part of two centuries.

The members of this religion, which preaches tolerance and places high emphasis the protection of the religious and political rights of all people, fit comfortably within the Jeffersonian ideal of religious diversity and regard for genuine religious freedom.

Thomas Jefferson, who knew that the essential protection of religious freedom involved a national commitment to guard against threats to worshipers, would surely have been aghast at the level or hatred and violence that has been directed at the roughly 500,000 American Sikhs in recent years. Though the Sikh faith is the fifth largest religion in the world, its followers are sometimes confused for Muslims and targeted with the same sorts of discrimination and violence that has afflicted followers of Islam. Since September 11, 2001, the Sikh Coalition, the largest civil rights group for Sikhs in the United States, says it has received thousands of requests for assistance from members of the Sikh community related to employment discrimination, hate crimes and school bullying. That this violence has now shaken not just one community or state but the nation should be recognized as a particular affront to the ideals espoused by Jefferson — and to the hopes of the most enlightened founders.

Jefferson never wanted there to be any doubt that religious freedom extended to those of all faiths, and that the essence of that freedom was the liberty to worship without threats or fear of violence of the sort that on Sunday left seven dead (included a reportedly white, non-Sikh shooter) at the Sikh temple in suburban Milwaukee.

In the Virginia stature that would serve as the underpinning for the constitutional protection of religious freedom, Jefferson wrote: “Be it enacted by the General Assembly that no man shall be compelled to frequent or support any religious worship, place, or ministry whatsoever, nor shall otherwise suffer on account of his religious opinions or belief; but that all men shall be free to profess, and by argument to maintain, their opinion in matters of religion, and that the same shall in no wise diminish, enlarge, or affect their civil capacities.”

Of course, Jefferson wanted future American presidents and political leaders to share his recognition that the “wall of separation” between church and state was designed to prevent favoritism of one doctrine or faith over another.

But he also wanted America to be a welcoming place for the followers of all faiths. And he wanted the believers in Muslims, Hindus, Jews, Christians and, yes, Sikhs to be safe from threats and violence.

The United States still needs to achieve the “religious freedom” that Jefferson outlined at the founding of the republic. President Obama responded appropriately to the initial shock of Sunday’s shootings, as did a number of other political leaders. But Obama should do more, and others in positions of leadership (particularly on the right-wing of the Republican Party) should do much more, to educate a changing nation about the necessity of tolerance and to celebrate America’s rapidly expanding religious diversity.

h/t: John Nichols at The Nation