<P> The Establishment Clause addressed the concerns of members of minority faiths who did not want the federal government to establish a state religion for the entire nation . The Baptists in Virginia, for example, had suffered discrimination prior to the disestablishment of the Anglican church in 1786 . As Virginia prepared to hold its elections to the state ratifying convention in 1788, the Baptists were concerned that the Constitution had no safeguard against the creation of a new national church . In Orange County, Virginia, two federalist candidates, James Madison and James Gordon Jr., were running against two anti-federalists (opponents of the Constitution), Thomas Barbour and Charles Porter . Barbour requested to John Leland, an influential Baptist preacher and fervent lifelong proponent of religious liberty, that he write a letter to Barbour outlining his objections to the proposed Constitution . Leland stated in the letter that, among his other concerns, the Constitution had no Bill of Rights and no safeguards for religious liberty and freedom of the press . A number of historians have concluded on the basis of compelling circumstantial evidence that, just prior to the election in March 1788, Madison met with Leland and gained his support of ratification by addressing these concerns and providing him with the necessary reassurances . In any event, Leland cast his vote for Madison . Leland's support, according to Scarberry, was likely key to the landslide victory of Madison and Gordon . </P> <P> Prior to the enactment of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution in 1868, the Supreme Court generally held that the substantive protections of the Bill of Rights did not apply to state governments . Subsequently, under the Incorporation doctrine, the Bill of Rights has been broadly applied to limit state and local government as well . The process of incorporating the two Religion Clauses in the First Amendment was twofold . The first step was the Supreme Court's conclusion in 1940 that the Free Exercise Clause was made applicable to the states through the Fourteenth Amendment . Conceptually, this raised few difficulties: the Due Process Clause protects those rights in the Bill of Rights "implicit in the concept of ordered liberty," and free exercise of religion is a quintessential individual right (and had been recognized as such at the state level from the beginning). </P> <P> Incorporation of the Establishment Clause in 1947 proved to be problematic in several ways and subject to critique . The controversy surrounding Establishment Clause incorporation primarily stems from the fact that one of the intentions of the Establishment Clause was to prevent Congress from interfering with state establishments of religion that existed at the time of the founding (at least six states had established religions at the founding)--a fact conceded by even those members of the Court who believe the Establishment Clause was made applicable to the states through incorporation . Critics have also argued that the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment is understood to incorporate only individual rights found in the Bill of Rights; the Establishment Clause, unlike the Free Exercise Clause (which critics readily concede protects individual rights), does not purport to protect individual rights . </P> <P> The Supreme Court first considered the question of financial assistance to religious organizations in Bradfield v. Roberts (1899). The federal government had funded a hospital operated by a Roman Catholic institution . In that case, the Court ruled that the funding was to a secular organization--the hospital--and was therefore permissible . </P>

When does a government policy violate the establishment clause