Religion has played a remarkably prominent role in this year’s presidential race. Mike Huckabee won the Republican caucuses in Iowa after promoting himself there as a “Christian Leader.” Mitt Romney, hounded by questions about his Mormonism, gave a tour-de-force speech affirming his faith and advocating a greater role for religion in the public square. Barack Obama rebutted suggestions that he is a Muslim by touting his belief in Jesus Christ and his long history of church-going. He also sponsored a Gospel music tour in South Carolina.

This conspicuously religious primary season, however, has not yielded particularly religious results.  Of the three remaining candidates, two are among the least religious of the bunch. John McCain and Hillary Clinton seem less personally religious and less sympathetic to religious concerns than others within their respective parties.

What does this portend for the next administration? Regardless of which party wins the presidency, there may be reason to fear a retreat from President George W. Bush’s commitment to government-supported faith-based initiatives. Even Barack Obama, who has expressed concern about “faith experience” in this country, remains noncommittal regarding the success of Bush’s efforts. He could move away from faith-based efforts as easily as Clinton and McCain.

Such a retreat would be easy enough. We know already that the new administration will have a broad mandate for “change.” And if Americans know one thing about religion and government, they know the phrase “separation of church and state.” If the next president wants to re-separate government from religion, she or he will probably find it easy to do.

Bush, however, is not the only president who would urge his successor to maintain partnerships between government and faith-based organizations. Our first president, George Washington, whose birthday we celebrate today, would say the same thing.

In 1796, after serving two terms as president, Washington said in his farewell speech that “[o]f all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, Religion and morality are indispensable supports.” Washington continued in the same speech to express doubt “that morality can be maintained without religion,” and to caution that “reason & experience both forbid us to expect that National morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle.”

These were not stray remarks. Washington spent more than four decades in public service: first as a commander in the colonial military, then as a legislator in Virginia, then as the commander-in-chief of the American army, then as the president of the Constitutional Convention, then as the first president of our newly formed nation.

Time and time again over this long public career, Washington encountered questions about the proper role of religion in American civic life. Should the government pay for military chaplains? Should Quakers be forced to fight in the army, despite their pacifist religious beliefs? Should citizens be taxed to support churches? Should religious groups receive government land grants? Should the President of the United States declare days of prayer and thanksgiving?

From these experiences Washington forged a common-sense, practical approach to matters of church and state. He concluded that government should not only accommodate religion but also promote it, albeit typically in non-denominational ways and with great care for the rights of religious minorities. So, for instance, Washington lobbied for government-paid military chaplains, but he appointed such chaplains from a wide variety of denominations.

Washington also ordered his troops to attend religious services. He supported public subsidies for religious missionaries to the Indians. And as president, he declared days of prayer and thanksgiving.

In each instance, Washington sought a position that best served the public good. Religion, as Washington saw it, was a prerequisite for the virtue and morality that make self-government possible. Washington maintained this perspective throughout his career. Perhaps most importantly, his approach did not change after passage of the First Amendment during his first presidential term.

How did all this square with the “separation of church and state”? It didn’t. That phrase was entirely foreign to George Washington. The phrase “separation of church and state” did not appear in the American political lexicon until 1802—when the third president of the United States, Thomas Jefferson, used the phrase to describe his own interpretation of the First Amendment’s religion clauses. By the time Jefferson offered that interpretation, the First Amendment had been on the books for more than 10 years, and Washington was dead.

In his State of the Union address last month, President Bush remarked aptly that faith-based organizations “are bringing hope to pockets of despair, with newfound support from the federal government.” Those who are vying to be the next president should listen not only to George Bush, but also to George Washington, on this vital issue.

Tara Ross and Joe Smith are co-authors of the recently released Under God: George Washington and the Question of Church and State.

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