No religion had a place in the Constitution. The complete separation of Church and State had been decreed. But Jefferson, who more than any other single man had insisted on the separation of Church and State and had fought a successful battle on the issue in the Virginia Assembly, had been habitually denounced as an anti-Christ by the political preachers of his time. He was still hated in Virginia for breaking the connection, and in the New England States, where the greater part of the ministers were militant Federalists, he was hated with an unholy hate. More false witness had been borne by the ministers of New England and New York against Jefferson than had ever been borne against any other American publicist. In Connecticut, where the ministers were absolute dictators of the State, it was a vital issue. It was Hamilton's thought to mobilize all these hates of pious men and to alarm the Christian masses with the fear that the triumph of the democratic principles of Jefferson would mean the downfall of the religion of Jesus Christ. History has shown that on no subject can human passions be aroused to such a murderous frenzy as on that of man's relation to his Maker.
- from page 145, Jefferson in Power