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Contemporary liberals who advocate strict separation between church and state often defend themselves by suggesting that such a position is the only one compatible with the principle of liberal neutrality, whose origins go back to John Locke's first Letter on Toleration. This essay argues that this line of reasoning is mistaken. While Locke did endorse the neutrality principle, he did not endorse strict separation, and this fact suggests that the connection between liberal neutrality and strict separation is not as secure as many liberals have assumed. This examination of Locke's attitudes toward neutrality and strict separation aims both to clarify what is at stake in contemporary debates over strict separation in liberal states and to consider the conditions that would have to be met to mount a Lockean argument against weakening church-state separation in contemporary liberal states.

The question has repeatedly obtruded itself in the past four years whether the recent legislation intended to prevent employer denial of collective bargaining to employees necessarily leads to a degree of government control over labor representation previously unknown in this country. In facing this question there is no implication that government control over worker organization was intended. The purpose behind the legislation was undoubtedly to prevent interference by employers with the organization of workers and refusal by employers of collective bargaining. Nevertheless, the entrance of the government into the field to prevent employer interference with worker representation has apparently led also to the curtailment of the freedom of the workers in this sphere.