By Bob Allen
A former Southern Baptist pastor turned state lawmaker has introduced legislation to designate the Bible “the official state book” of Tennessee.
Rep. Jerry Sexton, a Republican from Bean Station in the Morristown metropolitan area in East Tennessee, introduced a bill Feb. 11 proclaiming, “The Holy Bible is hereby designated as the official state book.”
Sexton, 57, founder and owner of Sexton Furniture Manufacturing, said during his campaign that he served 25 straight years as a pastor before stepping down in 2012 from Noeton Baptist Church “feeling God was leading me in a different direction.”
In 2014 he ran for the Tennessee General Assembly, defeating incumbent David Roach in the Republican primary and winning the general election in the fall unopposed.
Sexton, the son of a coal miner and the oldest of 10 children, describes himself as “more pro-life than your pastor, more for the Second Amendment than Davy Crockett and more for traditional marriage than Adam and Eve.”
Noeton Baptist Church is affiliated with the Southern Baptist Convention, Tennessee Baptist Convention and Grainger Baptist Association.
Sexton’s legislation mirrors similar bills offered in Louisiana and Mississippi.
Republican State Rep. Thomas Carmody withdrew his bill to make the Bible the official state book in Louisiana before it made it to a full vote of the state House of Representatives in April, saying it had become a distraction.
In Mississippi, Democratic Reps. Tom Miles and Michael Evans introduced legislation in January designating the Holy Bible as the state’s official book. Both identify as Baptists, Miles as a member of Forest Baptist Church in Morton, Miss.
Evans, who operates a poultry farm in Preston, Miss., attends Dry Creek Baptist Church in Philadelphia. He told the Mobile Press-Register that he got the idea for the Bible bill talking to constituents about “all the things going wrong in the world” when one of them “made a comment that people ought to start reading the Bible.”
As a Baptist, Evans, said, “I believe in the Bible.”
Tennessee already has state symbols including the Tennessee Cave Salamander as official state amphibian and an official state beverage of milk. Tennessee recognizes 10 official state songs, including Tennessee Waltz, Rocky Top and a Tennessee Bicentennial Rap, adopted in 1996 as an easy way for students to learn and retain elements of the state’s history.
Hedy Weinberg, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Tennessee, told the Associated Press that Sexton’s proposal would violate both the state and federal constitutions.
The Tennessee Constitution states “that no preference shall ever be given, by law, to any religious establishment or mode of worship,” language dating back to the original constitution adopted when Tennessee became a state in 1796.