Cute. But I can't blame you for pushing Justice Story aside as quickly as possible. He proves you are either a babbling idiot, or a blatant liar, when it comes to our Christian Heritage.
Our Founding Fathers did not believe that. they believed that People should promote Christianity - not the government.
Prove it. While you are at it, explain the 1844 ruling by the Supreme Court in the Vidal Case , and the 1892 ruling by the Supreme Court in the Holy Trinity case, where the opinion included, "If we pass beyond these matters to a view of American life, as expressed by its laws, its business, its customs, and its society, we find everywhere a clear recognition of the same truth. Among other matters note the following: The form of oath universally prevailing, concluding with an appeal to the Almighty; the custom of opening sessions of all deliberative bodies and most conventions with prayer; the prefatory words of all wills, "In the name of God, amen;" the laws respecting the observance of the Sabbath, with the general cessation of all secular business, and the closing of courts, legislatures, and other similar public assemblies on that day; the churches and church organizations which abound in every city, town, and hamlet; the multitude of charitable organizations existing everywhere under Christian auspices; the gigantic missionary associations, with general support, and aiming to establish Christian missions in every quarter of the globe. These and many other matters which might be noticed, add a volume of unofficial declarations to the mass of organic utterances that this is a Christian nation."
There is a huge difference between a President offering a prayer and a law requiring religious teaching and religious behavior.
Would the daily congressional prayers count as non-religious behavior?
This site offers many good references supporting the fact that this is a Christian Nation.
Not at all. I used opinions from more Supreme Court Justices with longer and more respectable careers and you denied their expertise on the basis that they were judges. Then you find one judge that agrees with your opinion and he becomes absolute. That's not exactly honest thinking.
Prove it
The Constitution requires that faith not be an issue in government officers.
Any mention of Christianity is omitted from the Constitution. The Preamble invokes the People, not God.
The Constitutional Convention refused to have prayers open sessions. (1787: The Grand Convention, Clinton Rossiter)
The Federalist Papers do not site any Biblical basis for our government - Greece and Rome are used. The only religious references are "Nature's God" (not Christian), "Almighty," and "Heaven." (#'s 20, 38, 40)
Likewise, the Declaration of Independence, Jefferson as primary author, used "the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God." No "Christian" terms were used.
Christian preachers attacked the Constitution during ratification because it wasn't a Christian document.
Kramick, Moore, The Godless Constitution quote articles from ratification saying the lack of religious tests would allow, "1st. Quakers, who will make the blacks saucy, and at the same time deprive us of the means of defence - 2dly. Mahometans, who ridicule the Trinity - 3dly. Deists, abominable wretches - 4thly. Negroes, the seed of Cain - 5thly. Beggars, who when set on horseback will ride to the devil - 6thly. Jews etc. etc."
Another contemporary account of the Founders said, " Constitution is de[i]stical in principle, and in all probability the composers had no thought of God in all their conclusions."(Kramick)
The sources of the Founding Fathers in the enlightenment were not only homegrown varieties like Paine, a deist like Jefferson, but also Locke, Rousseau, and Voltaire, all humanists. No 'divine' sources.
Words from the Founding Fathers:
John Adams wrote in "A Defence of the Constitutions of Government of the United States of America," 1787:
The United States of America have exhibited, perhaps, the first example of governments erected on the simple principles of nature; and if men are now sufficiently enlightened to disabuse themselves of artifice, imposture, hypocrisy, and superstition, they will consider this event as an era in their history. Although the detail of the formation of the American governments is at present little known or regarded either in Europe or in America, it may hereafter become an object of curiosity. It will never be pretended that any persons employed in that service had interviews with the gods, or were in any degree under the influence of Heaven, more than those at work upon ships or houses, or laboring in merchandise or agriculture; it will forever be acknowledged that these governments were contrived merely by the use of reason and the senses.Thirteen governments [of the original states] thus founded on the natural authority of the people alone, without a pretence of miracle or mystery, and which are destined to spread over the northern part of that whole quarter of the globe, are a great point gained in favor of the rights of mankind."
Of course, many use the example from the Treaty of Tripoli that Adams signed as President, ratified by the Senate containing Founders, and part of the laws of the land as described by the Constitution, wherein Article 11 begins:
"As the Government of the United States of America is not in any sense founded on the Christian religion;
James Madison, "Father of the Constitution," wrote, as used in the Remonstrance,
"What influence, in fact, have ecclesiastical establishments had on society? In some instances they have been seen to erect a spiritual tyranny on the ruins of the civil authority; on many instances they have been seen upholding the thrones of political tyranny; in no instance have they been the guardians of the liberties of the people. Rulers who wish to subvert the public liberty may have found an established clergy convenient auxiliaries. A just government, instituted to secure and perpetuate it, needs them not."
In his letter to Livingston, 1822:
"And I have no doubt that every new example will succeed, as every past one has done, in shewing that religion & Govt will both exist in greater purity, the less they are mixed together."
Ben Franklin wrote in essays a distrust of the power of Christianity such as from "Toleration":
If we look back into history for the character of the present sects in Christianity, we shall find few that have not in their turns been persecutors, and complainers of persecution.
Thomas Paine, in the Age of Reason, a primary influence on the Founding Fathers:
"Of all the systems of religion that ever were invented, there is no more derogatory to the Almighty, more unedifiying to man, more repugnant to reason, and more contradictory to itself than this thing called Christianity."Thomas Jefferson created the phrase Separation of Church and State, Danbury letter, and in response to the Virgnia Act:
"Where the preamble declares, that coercion is a departure from the plan of the holy author of our religion, an amendment was proposed by inserting "Jesus Christ," so that it would read "A departure from the plan of Jesus Christ, the holy author of our religion;" the insertion was rejected by the great majority, in proof that they meant to comprehend, within the mantle of its protection, the Jew and the Gentile, the Christian and Mohammedan, the Hindoo and Infidel of every denomination."
During the Trinity case, Brewer wrote the quote you used in dicta.
Later Brewer felt obliged to explain himself: "But in what sense can [the United States] be called a Christian nation? Not in the sense that Christianity is the established religion or the people are compelled in any manner to support it. On the contrary, the Constitution specifically provides that 'Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.' Neither is it Christian in the sense that all its citizens are either in fact or in name Christians. On the contrary, all religions have free scope within its borders. Numbers of our people profess other religions, and many reject all." Judge Brewer, Christian Nation, 1905
Would the daily congressional prayers count as non-religious behavior?
There is no such thing as "daily congressional prayers." There are prayers at the opening of sessions of Congress. This a prayer by a group of individuals - not against the Constitution. A legislative requirement for prayer - against the Constitution. Do you see the difference? Members of government at any level can pray or use religious language, if the voters don't like it - they not reelect him. If a member of a government at any level requires a religious belief or behavior as part of law, the voters are screwed.
The conclusion is that the American experiment in democracy was one wherein government and religion would be separated for the first time in much of human history. Religion belongs in the control OF the people, not to control the people through government. Taking religion out of the government ensures maximum freedom of religion of the people. A religious people will provide a firm basis for a free government. A religious government only leads to tyranny.