President George Washington wrote, “The bosom of America,” was to be “open to receive the oppressed and persecuted of all nations and relations; whom we shall welcome to a participation of all our rights and privileges. They may be [Muslims], Jews or Christians of any sect, or they may be atheists.” Thomas Jefferson wrote, “Our country has been the first to prove to the world two truths the most salutary to human society, that man can govern himself, and that religious freedom is the most effective anodyne against religious dissension: the maxims of civil government being reversed in that of
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