Researcher Uncovers the Unexpected History of Separating Church and State

A forthcoming book from a Penn Arts and Sciences professor will showcase how the formal separation of church and state moved slavery to the political sphere, but defenders of slavery argued that religious critiques of slavery violated that separation. 

Sarah Barringer Gordon, a history professor in Penn Arts and Sciences and the Arlin M. Adams Professor of Constitutional Law at Penn Law, is in the process of writing Freedom’s Holy Light: Disestablishment in America, 1776-1876, which will offer fresh perspectives on the disestablishment of religion during the century following the American Revolution.

In Freedom’s Holy Light, Gordon hopes to explore the separation of church and state not in theory but in practice. No one has ever studied how it worked “on the ground,” she says.

“Disestablishment was widely assumed to separate religion from politics. At the same time, defenders of slavery understood the institution as a purely political one,” Gordon says. “The idea that religion and politics were so separate that a person could confine slavery to only the political side of the spectrum and keep religion completely separate—this notion was misguided and unworkable.”

Click here to read the full release.

Arts & Sciences News

Azuma and Hart Named Roy F. and Jeannette P. Nichols Professors of American History

Eiichiro Azuma specializes in Asian American and transpacific history, while Emma Hart teaches and researches the history of early North America, the Atlantic World, and early modern Britain between 1500 and 1800.

View Article >
Arts & Sciences Students Honored during 37th Annual Women of Color Day

Sade Taiwo, C’25, and Kyndall Nicholas, a Ph.D. candidate in neuroscience, were honored for their work.

View Article >
Nine College Students and Alums Named Thouron Scholars; Will Pursue Graduate Studies in the U.K.

The Scholars are six seniors and three recent graduates whose majors range from neuroscience to communication.

View Article >
Irma Elo Named Tamsen and Michael Brown Presidential Professor in Sociology

Elo’s main research interests center on inequalities in health and mortality across the life course and demographic estimation of mortality. In recent years, she has extended her research to include predictors of cognition in high-, middle-, and low-income countries.

View Article >
Julia Hartmann Named Fay R. and Eugene L. Langberg Professor in Mathematics

She specializes in algebra and arithmetic geometry, a newer field that applies techniques from algebraic geometry to solve problems in number theory and co-developed the method of field patching.

View Article >
Holger Sieg Named Baird Term Professor of Economics

Sieg focuses his research on public and urban economics, as well as the political economy of state and local governments.

View Article >