Tennessee gov. rejects Bible as state book, but veto override looming

The official rock of Tennessee is limestone. The raccoon is the state’s official wild animal.

But the state still does not have an official book.

Republican Gov. Bill Haslam last week vetoed a bill that would have added the Bible to Tennessee’s list of official state symbols, but lawmakers have already threatened to override his decision.

In Haslam’s veto message to the Republican lawmakers who sponsored the bill, he wrote in defense of Christian beliefs: “I strongly disagree with those who are trying to drive religion out of the public square.”

However, Haslam said, there’s the matter of constitutional law —separation of church and state.

“If we are recognizing the Bible as a sacred text, then we are violating the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of the State of Tennessee by designating it as the official book,” Haslam wrote. “Our founders recognized that when the church and state were combined, it was the church that suffered in the long run.”

Haslam’s veto came a little more than a week after Idaho Republican Gov. C.L. “Butch” Otter vetoed a bill that would have allowed the Bible to be used in public schools for instruction, also citing constitutional concerns.

In Tennessee, all it takes to override a veto are majority votes in both chambers of the Legislature, and the bill’s two Republican sponsors have already signaled their intent to go around the governor.

Eighty-one percent of Tennessee’s adults are Christians, according to the Pew Research Center.