The Rise and Decline of American Religious Freedom - Hardcoverby Steven D. Smith (Author) Familiar accounts of religious freedom in the United States often tell a story of visionary founders who broke from the centuries old patterns of Christendom to establish a political arrangement committed to secular and religiously neutral government. These novel commitments were supposedly embodied in the religion clauses of the First Amendment. But this story is largely a fairytale, Steven D. Smith says in this incisive