ABSTRACT
By 1784, when John Carroll became Prefect-Apostolic over the Catholic Church in the United States, the country had begun to move, however cautiously, in the direction of religious freedom for all groups and the separation of church and state. The religious clauses of the Massachusetts' Bill of Rights, adopted in 1780, rested upon some basic assumptions: that religion was essential to the happiness of a people and necessary for the preservation of civil society. The Virginia Assembly implemented the religious article of the Declaration of Rights by enacting into law a bill drafted by Mason. Carroll's acceptance of religious freedom did not imply an indifference to religion or doctrinal relativism. He believed religion essential to the happiness of man and the social order—and he never doubted that "true religion" resided in the Catholic faith. John Carroll, in his letter to the editor of the Columbian Magazine, seemed to limit the full enjoyment of religious equality to Christians.
