To say that religion cannot stand without a state establishment is not only contrary to fact (as has been proved already) but is a contradiction in phrase. Religion must have stood a time before any law could have been made about it; and if it did stand almost three hundred years without law it can still stand without it.

John Leland (1754-1841) American Baptist minister, civil libertarian

The Connecticut Dissenters Strong Box, #1 (1802)