The first sentence of the First Amendment to our national Constitution begins with these words: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press …” Expressing and exercising these beginning freedoms have been essential in our public discourse for centuries. Other nation-states have modeled our Constitution and carefully watched as we practiced and protected these civic freedoms and rights. These worldviews are crucial parts of our past and future. However, John Adams, one of our country’s founding fathers, is famously quoted as warning, “Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”  Today, it seems political and religious leftists would turn these essential viewpoints upside down. Some say religious faith may be permitted only if it is not publicly practiced, even if it is peacefully expressed and lived out.  One of our most sacred rights is not violating one’s faith. Yet, today, some pro-life health care workers are pressured into assisting in abortions and, thus, violating their religious freedoms and faith. And, many pro-life pharmacists, instead of being accommodated for the practices of their faith, have reported being targeted for refusing to dispense abortion pills. The Democrat Party has gone from Bill Clinton’s promise of “safe, legal and rare” abortions to someone telling a doctor, “My ‘right’ to abortion trumps your ‘right of conscience.’ So, I can force you to be complicit in what you believe is murder.”  Many have never seen a more significant contrast of worldviews than the 2024 U.S. presidential elections. The current Democrat positions on abortion seem to be taxpayer-funded abortion “on demand,” with no restrictions up to the moment of birth, where they do not want to provide equitable, postnatal care to a newborn surviving a botched abortion. Planned Parenthood bizarrely calls “religion” an excuse.” The Constitution calls it a right. Choose prayerfully. Your vote can help defend unborn babies and pro-life Americans!  Gary Curtis Newhall The post Gary Curtis | Our Very First Freedoms appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.