The Separation of Church and State: Free Writing

The Separation of Church and State is a highly controversial issue in American society. For so long, it has been both an ideological conflict as well as a source of real world problems. . Many devoutly religious claim that the founding fathers of our nation founded our nation under Christian principles while many critics claim that the founding fathers intended for the government and the church to remain as separate entities as there are people of all different beliefs in our nation. In this paper, I will first examine the separation of church and state ideologically and then follow by discussing real life issues that stem from this including the use of the use of “Under God” in the Pledge of Allegiance, the printing of “In God We Trust” on all coins, and the passage of the Blue Laws. Tentative Thesis: The Separation of Church and State, the ideological concept of a barrier between governmental and religious activities, has stood since the founding fathers of the United States wrote the Constitution; however, there have been many instances in modern society of which its enforcement has been questionable.
In this research, I wish to study a huge variety of different writings on this topic. I will study the writings of scholars on all sides as well as the writings of ordinary people who feel strongly about this topic. I will also examine various Supreme Court rulings on cases related to this. I will also read various government documents about this. In addition to this, I will explore visual rhetoric and its extensive use in conveying the opinions of varying sides on the issue of the separation of church and state.
Unfortunately, there are some inevitable problems that I will encounter. First of all, this paper is on a highly controversial issue and is written for a wide audience; therefore I must be very careful in order to avoid offending anyone whose views differ from mine. In addition to this, I must also make sure that I carefully examine the views of all sides and do not just focus on my own view point in order to avoid losing the respect of the reader(s).
Image Source: http://www.quizlaw.com/blog/images/churchAndState.jpg

This is a rough sketch of how I could plan an argument. However, the actual research was completely different from this, especially since I shifted from arguing about the Separation of Church and State in general to just arguing about the Blue Laws.