In 1788, Thomas Jefferson sent a letter from Paris to an American, his partner in a business venture importing fine French wines to Virginia. That letter would change constitutional history almost a century later. In fact, the “wall of separation between church and state” would never have entered our legal lexicon but for Thomas Jefferson’s love of what the Founders called “claret”—red wines from the Bordeaux region of France.
This is just one example of how focusing on the Founders and their wines can offer striking insights into constitutional meaning. We thought we would share both those observations and some recommendations for wines to go along with them. Think of it as an exercise in discovering constitutional veritas in vino.
Today’s essay is a Constitution Day appetizer featuring church, state, and claret. Here is how the vineyards of Bordeaux led to the wall of separation between church and state.
Well after the Civil War—and exactly four score and seven years after the adoption of the Bill of Rights—the Supreme Court heard its first case involving the First Amendment’s religion clauses. The case, Reynolds v. United States, involved a twice-married Mormon leader seeking a religious exemption from a federal anti-bigamy law under the Free Exercise Clause. The religion clauses do not mention exemptions, or, for that matter, the separation of church and state. Instead, they say “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.”
Chief Justice Morison Waite was not sure what that meant, so he reached out to his friend George Bancroft, the most famous historian in America. Bancroft pointed to Jefferson, but did not explain why Jefferson held the key to the religion clauses. So the Chief Justice dug into Jefferson’s recently published collected works.
The index directed Waite to a then-obscure, but now-famous 1802 letter. Writing to a group of Baptists in Danbury, Connecticut, Jefferson declared that the religion clauses built “a wall of separation between church and state.”
But Waite still had a problem if he wanted to invoke this Jeffersonian quotation. During the entire time the religion clauses were being drafted, debated, and ratified, Jefferson was Minister to France. What could make Jefferson so important to the First Amendment that his wall-of-separation letter should be the official interpretation of the religion clauses?
Delving further into Jefferson’s works in hopes of finding a way to highlight Jefferson’s importance as a constitutional spokesman, Waite found a lengthy correspondence with Alexander Donald, a well-connected Virginian in the import-export business. Most of their letters dealt with Jefferson’s advice on the best of Bordeaux, especially the four wines still considered among the finest in the world: Châteaux Margaux, Haut-Brion, Latour, and Lafite. In one 1788 letter, for example, Jefferson alerted Donald to an upcoming shipment of Château Margaux 1784, which he hailed as the best vintage in nine years.
But a second 1788 letter to Donald is the subject of today’s story. It would end up building the wall of separation between church and state.
Commenting on the process of ratifying the Constitution, Jefferson wrote, “I wish with all my soul that the nine first Conventions may accept the new Constitution, because this will secure to us the good it contains.” Nevertheless, Jefferson hoped for a few amendments, writing, “I equally wish that the four latest conventions … may refuse to accede to it till a declaration of rights be annexed … which shall stipulate freedom of religion, freedom of the press,” and so on.
Alexander Donald passed this letter along to his friend Patrick Henry, and it was one of the many things mentioned during the debates at the Virginia ratifying convention. That is the only link Waite found between Jefferson and the adoption of the First Amendment.
Based on that stunningly flimsy connection—a letter to a business partner saying that Jefferson hoped that a few states, but not too many, would recommend amendments—Chief Justice Waite deemed Jefferson “an acknowledged leader of the advocates” of the religion clauses. Therefore, he concluded, Jefferson’s wall-of-separation letter “may be accepted almost as an authoritative declaration of the scope and effect of the amendment.”
In the end, Mr. Reynolds did not get his exemption, with the Chief Justice simply declaring that to allow someone to “excuse his practices … because of his religious belief” would be to “make the professed doctrines of religious belief superior to the law of the land, and, in effect, to permit every citizen to become a law unto himself.”
From that point forward, Jefferson’s wall would constantly reappear as an authoritative gloss on the text of the Establishment Clause.
While Jefferson’s wall of separation turned out not to be critical for the decision in the Reynolds Free Exercise case, Chief Justice Waite’s historical arguments would become essential for the Court’s interpretation of the Establishment Clause in Everson v. Board of Education (1947). Citing only the Reynolds case, Justice Black’s majority opinion declared that, in “the words of Jefferson, the clause against establishment of religion by law was intended to erect “a wall of separation between church and State.” From that point forward, Jefferson’s wall would constantly reappear as an authoritative gloss on the text of the Establishment Clause.
Constitutional history would have been quite different if Chief Justice Waite had not focused on Jefferson, but instead had asked those who, as Alexander Hamilton might have put it, were in the room where it happened. There, they would have heard James Madison and other Framers say that the goal of the religion clauses was to ensure “that congress should not establish a religion, and enforce the legal observation of it by law, nor compel men to worship God … contrary to their conscience.” But Waite turned instead to the wine-loving Minister to France, and ever since, few discussions of the religion clauses have failed to mention a Jeffersonian wall that owes its origins much more to claret than the Constitution.
A Bordeaux Tasting
Perhaps the best way to mark this pivotal constitutional moment would be to open a bottle of Château Margaux, the wine Jefferson sent to his partner Alexander Donald in 1788. But, at about $600 a bottle for the 2021 vintage—which will not be ready to drink for at least a decade or two—it may be too expensive for all but the most devoted admirers of the wall of separation.
A somewhat more affordable (⁓$70) red wine from the same Bordeaux neighborhood is Ségla. It is an earlier drinking, “second” wine from the famous Château Rauzan-Ségla, which was founded in the 1600s. Jefferson spoke highly of this historic wine producer, enigmatically telling Donald that, if he were to visit “Madame Rozan,” mentioning Jefferson’s name would be helpful.
But since this is a Constitution Day appetizer course, we are recommending white Bordeaux wines, which pair exceptionally well with goat cheese salads. In another note to his wine partner Donald, Jefferson cited Châteaux Carbonnieux’s Sauvignon Blanc-based wine as one of Bordeaux’s best. It is a blend that incorporates Sémillon, which, along with some time aging in oak, softens the aroma and feel of the wine in your mouth. La Croix de Carbonnieux (⁓$25) or Châteaux Carbonnieux Blanc (⁓$50) are both great choices.
For an excellent Constitution Day appetizer course, pair a Château Carbonnieux or another Bordeaux Blanc with this recipe for a prosciutto-wrapped goat cheese salad.
While you are sipping your claret or Bordeaux Blanc, take a moment on this Constitution Day to reflect on how this snippet of wine history has helped us see just how badly the Supreme Court has misread constitutional history. In the future, we look forward to sharing more places where, to paraphrase the Apostle Paul, a little wine knowledge can be good for your Constitution.
Dining and Cooking