By Forrest L. Marion

The Constitution’s Article I, Section 7, deals with the procedure for bills passed by the Congress which are sent to the President for signature or veto: “If any Bill shall not be returned by the President within ten Days (Sundays excepted) after it shall have been presented to him, the Same shall be a Law, in like Manner as if he had signed it.” Today, that little clause may be missed. It was not missed by our Presbyterian forebears; and a few pastors and churchmen wrote about it.

The underlying impulse seems clear enough for the recent, highly publicized evangelical worship service held at the Pentagon, at which defense secretary Pete Hegseth participated in a prominent role by leading the opening prayer. After four years of Pentagon leadership that undermined, first, combat readiness; and, second, traditional, Christian-based morality, beliefs, and practices (these were related) – which included attacking the constitutional rights of U.S. citizens regarding religion and expression – the defense chief wanted to signal that those days are over. I join the multitudes who give thanks to God who “nullifies the counsel of the nations.”

However, the event also elicited the latest iteration of one of the oldest and most effective deceptions of that part of our citizenry for whom the Ten Commandments are anathema, at least when politically convenient to oppose them. One outlet with close ties to the military solemnly warned of the Pentagon worship service – intended as a monthly event – as “a move that pushes the boundaries of Constitutional prohibition against a state religion… .”

But is this the case? Especially since the nationwide controversy in the early 1800s over the transportation of the U.S. mails and opening of post offices on the Christian Sabbath (Lord’s Day), the most popular cry of those watchmen opposed to the upholding of God’s moral law has been the warning of a union of church and state. The alarm sounded in response to the efforts in communities nationwide to draw up petitions (or memorials) listing their reasons for requesting the government not to require the violation of the Christian Sabbath by the nearly thirty thousand citizens who worked for the postal department. Moreover, their example, sanctioned by Congress, could only prove de-moralizing for the populace. Local citizens signed the petitions and sent them to Washington City. For many, it was the first time they had exercised their coveted First Amendment right “to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.” While we yawn today, our forebears took this right seriously.

(Beginning in 1829 the petitioners were vilified for supposedly requesting Congress to decide a religious question. But the charge was entirely false and a deception which, unfortunately, many citizens unknowingly accepted.)

For long years many commentators have limited their attention on “state religion” to the First Amendment’s wording that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,” which alluded to the establishments of the British colonies that eventually formed the United States. Noted historian Richard Hofstadter, of Columbia University when it was a serious academic institution, categorized what he called “the old free colonies … which never had state churches” (Rhode Island, Pennsylvania, Delaware, New Jersey); “the vacant establishments,” where the Anglican church was established but was too weak to do much about dissenters (New York, Maryland, the Carolinas, Georgia); Virginia, the lone “effective Anglican establishment”; and “the most powerful establishments” of Puritan Massachusetts and Connecticut. But the Constitution has more to say.

The Constitution‘s Article I, Section 7, deals with the procedure for bills passed by the Congress which are sent to the President for signature or veto: “If any Bill shall not be returned by the President within ten Days (Sundays excepted) after it shall have been presented to him, the Same shall be a Law, in like Manner as if he had signed it… .” Today, that little clause may be missed. It was not missed by our Presbyterian forebears; and a few pastors and churchmen wrote about it.

In 1829 a Virginia correspondent – almost certainly a Presbyterian pastor or attorney – using the pen name, “MEMORIALIST,” asked of the Constitution: “Why is this day [Sunday] excepted? Because it was supposed that in all time to come it would be regarded as a day of rest from secular business, and sacred also to God and devotion.”

MEMORIALIST included a familiar argument: if, by Congress’s postal law – which required the Sabbath’s desecration and loss of the day of rest by postal employees – the fourth commandment became no longer morally binding,

then neither are the other precepts of the moral law. They rest on the same authority; and must stand or fall together. And who, let us ask, is prepared to erase them all, and thus legalize profanity, idolatry, murder, and adultery? If you decide that any one is not of divine authority, you must, on the same principle, proscribe the whole, and so leave us naught but a “tabula rasa"—a mere blank!

Another Presbyterian went further in describing the significance of the clause. In 1830, the Calvinistic Magazine, under auspices of Presbyterians in East Tennessee, published a letter to the editors explaining the reasons for the Sundays excepted clause:

GENTLEMEN—It has always seemed to me that the following clause from the Constitution of the United States, is a plain recognition of the Christian Sabbath as the law of this land… . Why except Sunday, more than Saturday, or any other day? This is the question. And there can be but one answer. It is this—1st. Because the framers of the Constitution knew that Sunday was the established day of rest, and religious worship, in every State of this Union; and intended, therefore, to recognize it in the Federal Constitution. 2nd. Because they never expected a Jew to be President—or any other man to be President than one who would acknowledge the Christian religion as it is believed by the great body of the American people.

The writer continued, "Hence they speak about Sunday, as a day of religious rest for the President, just with that simple passing notice, with which men always allude to a subject perfectly understood by everybody.”

Careful Bible readers will say the same about a passage like 2 Corinthians 11:3, where Paul makes simple passing notice of a subject perfectly understood by all: “But I am afraid, lest as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, your minds should be led astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ.” Paul did not need to argue for the historicity of Adam, Eve, a Garden, or a serpent. A passing reference was sufficient.

This point is critical: when something is known and accepted by all, it needs no explanation.

The U.S. Constitution was not an isolated case of affirming the Christian Sabbath, even if most people – including, sadly, U.S. congressmen – were unaware of it. In 1829, the U.S. Congress updated its provisions for the legislature of the Territory of Arkansas. Every bill that passed the Territory’s House of Representatives and Legislative Council was required to “be presented to the Governor of said Territory,” and any bill not “returned by the Governor within three days (Sunday excepted) after it shall have been presented, the same shall be a law… .” Moreover, unlike the original American States that carried their British colonial Sabbath day statutes into statehood, the Territory of Arkansas had no such colonial influence.

As some are aware, the U.S. Constitution is the “shortest written Constitution of any major government in the world.” Every word, indeed, every comma or semicolon, was intentional and is there for a reason. For some to say today that the phrase “Sundays excepted” is of no significance is simply not a credible argument.

So … is the country in legitimate danger – as some have suggested periodically for these last two centuries – of establishing a State church? The answer: No.

Two more points. First, readers must understand that the founders clearly intended for the new government to have a State-acknowledged ultimate authority. Every government has one, whether acknowledged or not. (If one insists on using the term establishment for such an acknowledgment, however, I suggest Hofstadter’s “vacant establishments” comes close.) Second, our Constitution forbids any “religious Test” for office or public trust, which means that those holding non-Christian beliefs are not prohibited from serving.

The ultimate authority under the Constitution was to be none other than the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments – for which the Christian Sabbath was representative. That is why officials place their hand on the Bible when taking the oath of office, among other practices.

Until the Constitution shall be amended, Pentagon prayers in the Name of Christ may continue. Preferably with grace, tolerance, and humility.

Forrest L. Marion, a ruling elder in the First Presbyterian Church (PCA), served in the U.S. Air Force and Air Force Reserve from 1980 to 2010. Upon earning a doctorate in U.S. history from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, he served as a military historian with the Department of the Air Force from 1998 to 2023. He is the author of four monographs (one coauthored), most recently Standing Up Space Force: The Road to the Nation’s Sixth Armed Service (Naval Institute Press, 2023).