discussion with a panel of all the presenters which included
extended exchanges between the presenters as well as with the
symposium participants, more than two hundred of whom had
registered from numerous colleges and universities and were
representative of a variety of academic disciplines. The essays
reflect the insights and interpretations of scholars and specialists
on American church-state relations. These essays are being
published at a time when there is growing clamor for a
reexamination of the religion clauses of the First Amendment,
the "First Freedom" of the Bill of Rights, both as to the clauses'
original intent and their appropriate application in
contemporary American society.

Special acknowledgment is made here to the authors of the
papers presented at the symposium and the special preparation
given by the authors to the writing of these essays for
publication in this volume. Without their manifestly scholarly
competence and incisive analyses of their subjects, the quality of
their presentations at the symposium and the publication of their
essays in this volume would have been greatly diminished. To
all the symposium participants, we are grateful. In addition,
grateful appreciation is here expressed to Robert M. Baird,
Charles W. Barrow, Rosalie Beck, James A. Curry, David M.
Guinn, David W. Hendon, Glenn O. Hilburn, David L. Long-
fellow, Robert T. Miller, Harold W. Osborne, Bob E. Patterson,
Robert L. Reid, Rufus B. Spain, and Stuart E. Rosenbaum for
assisting in the planning and convening of the symposium, and
to Wanda Gilbert for her assistance in coordinating mailings and
program plans for the symposium. We are grateful to Herbert
H. Reynolds, President of Baylor University, for his strong
encouragement and support and for the special participation of
John S. Belew, Provost and Executive Vice President of
Academic Affairs of Baylor University. My special gratitude is
here expressed to Marion Travis for her editorial assistance and
for being responsible for creating the camera ready copy for the
desktop publishing of this volume, in which she was ably

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