Published March 1997 — Download PDF of the original newspaper column
Byrd's-Eye View By U.S. Senator Robert C. Byrd Praying for Our Nation
Whenever I look back upon my early years growing up in West Virginia's southern coal communities, I am reminded of the central role that faith played in our lives. I can still recall the sound of my mother's prayers being offered up each night in the soft glow of a kerosene lamp. It was faith, to a large degree, which helped men to endure the blackness of the deep mines day in and day out, and faith which wives clutched, white-knuckled with fear, as they waited and watched for their husbands to emerge from the mines in the wake of an explosion. Throughout decades of enormous change, during the depths of the Great Depression, and in the aftermath of ruinous natural disasters, West Virginians have always turned to their faith for strength and guidance. Faith is what has kept us going when hope has been in short supply. I hesitate to imagine in what condition our state and our nation would be today were freedom of religion not among the basic tenets upon which our nation was founded. Judging from the proliferation of examples of the current fragile state of our moral fabric, it is evident that we need the anchor of faith today as much as we have ever needed it. Yet, ironically, our nation in recent years has been embarked on a course to discourage voluntary prayer in schools and in commencement exercises -- a course that, in effect, denies religious freedom to many of our most vulnerable citizens at a time when they are struggling to chart their futures and searching for a moral compass. I do not believe that the Constitutional Framers ever envisioned that their words would be so interpreted as to separate our young people from the practice of their religious faith in this way. I, therefore, have proposed a clarifying amendment to the Constitution. My amendment would make it clear that the words the Constitution uses with regard to the establishment and the free exercise of religion do not mean that voluntary prayer is prohibited from our public schools or their extracurricular activities. Just as we and our forefathers have found direction, strength, and inspiration in prayer, for the sake of our nation, our schoolchildren should not be denied the opportunity to voluntarily seek support and guidance from the Creator through prayer. March 12, 1997