Armstrong pointed out numerous declarations of his findings, including Article III of the Northwest Ordinance: "Religion, morality and knowledge are necessary to good government and the happiness of mankind, schools and the means of education shall forever be encouraged."
In addition, the official Acts of the Continental Congress in May 1776 read, "A day appointed of fasting and prayer so the nation might by a sincere repentance and thought through the merits and mediation of Jesus Christ obtain his pardon and forgiveness."
In 1777, Congress authorized chaplains for the Continental Army. They also provided more Bibles because of the shortage. A special committee reported that the use of the Bible is so universal and its importance so great that they recommended that Congress ordered the committee of Congress to import 20,000 Bibles. In September of 1777, the first act was to pass a resolution to open congress with a prayer.
1947 was when the turning of a new America happened. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Abington vs. Schempp, regarding the issue of a school policy of Bible reading. They ruled that "The First Amendment was not to strike merely at the official establishment of a single sect. It was to create a complete and permanent separation of the sphere of religious activity and civil authority.”
Those changes meant that public religious activity needed to be stopped. They then came up with an Establishment Test. So, if said person wants a religious activity to be constitutional, the primary purpose of the religious expression must be secular. This is impossible to prove, so every case is lost.
In 1962, Engel vs. Vitale involved a dispute about school prayer. The plaintiffs argued the prayers offended their clients religious sensibilities, and was an establishment of religion. The Supreme Court agreed. They deemed, a voluntary nondenominational recital of a prayer was an establishment of religion. And so, the establishment of religion at any level of government in the United States was unconstitutional.
"Our Christian virtues have been taken out of the schools; it's disgusting," Armstrong said. "Our nation was founded upon the accepted fact that English and American laws were based on the higher law of the Bible. We need to be concerned with the moral decay of America; and concerned that God has been banned from the public square."
