My interest in politics and philosophy has been rekindled, and my apathy has melted away, because this book revealed to me how tenuous many of my treasured freedoms are. I am quite appreciative that I have found this wonderful and forgotten source of secular eloquence. Robert Ingersoll, who seems to be an amazing speaker on the topics of religion, government, and liberty. The book also introduced me to the works of Col. Quite unrealistically, I had thought the cultural wars debating the role of religion in government and the role of government in religion originated in the 20th century. I was unaware of the very early opposition to the godless constitution of the United States. This book was a shock to me in many ways. Rich with such iconic figures as Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, Thomas Paine, and the once-famous Robert Green Ingersoll, Freethinkers restores to history the passionate humanists who struggled against those who would undermine the combination of secular government and religious liberty that is the glory of the American system. Moving from nineteenth-century abolitionism and suffragism through the twentieth century's civil liberties, civil rights, and feminist movements, Freethinkers illuminates the neglected achievements of secularists who, allied with tolerant believers, have led the battle for reform in the past and today. In impassioned, elegant prose, celebrated author Susan Jacoby traces more than two hundred years of secularist activism, beginning with the fierce debate over the omission of God from the Constitution.

'Jacoby accomplishes her task with clarity, thoroughness, and an engaging passion.'Īt a time when the separation of church and state is under attack as never before, Freethinkers offers a powerful defense of the secularist heritage that gave Americans the first government in the world founded not on the authority of religion but on the bedrock of human reason.

Freethinkers susan jacoby