In many places religion and seeking wealth were seen as
opposites, but in early America they were both part of the majority belief.
Freedom of speech and religion were among the most highly prized rights in the
American view, and the freedom to pursue happiness and increase one's worth and
property were of equal importance.
Freedom of religion, freedom of thought and
speech, and freedom of property and ownership are all vital to maintaining a
free society--and the reduction of any inalienable right eventually tends to
decrease all the others.
Tocqueville eloquently described the American view thus:
"Religion perceives that civil
liberty affords a noble exercise to the faculties of man and that the political
world is a field prepared by the Creator for the efforts of mind. Free and
powerful in its own sphere, satisfied with the place reserved for it, religion
never more surely establishes its empire than when it reigns in the hearts of
men unsupported by aught beside its native strength.
"Liberty regards religion as its
companion in all its battles and its triumphs, as the cradle of its infancy and
the divine source of its claims. It considers religion as the safeguard of
morality, and morality as the best security of law and the surest pledge of the
duration of freedom."
This is how
religion and liberty coexisted and supported each other in the American
founding. Both left room for each other and supported each other as long as
excesses were avoided.