Preamble
We the people of Maine, in order to establish justice,
insure tranquility, provide for our mutual defense, promote our common welfare,
and secure to ourselves and our posterity the blessings of liberty,
acknowledging with grateful hearts the goodness of the Sovereign Ruler of the
Universe in affording us an opportunity, so favorable to the design; and,
imploring God's aid and direction in its accomplishment, do agree to form
ourselves into a free and independent State, by the style and title of the State
of Maine and do ordain and establish the following Constitution for the
government of the same.
Article I, section
3
All individuals have a natural and unalienable right to
worship Almighty God according to the dictates of their own consciences, and no
person shall be hurt, molested or restrained in that person's liberty or estate
for worshiping God in the manner and season most agreeable to the dictates of
that person's own conscience, nor for that person's religious professions or
sentiments, provided that that person does not disturb the public peace, nor
obstruct others in their religious worship; -- and all persons demeaning
themselves peaceably, as good members of the State, shall be equally under the
protection of the laws, and no subordination nor preference of any one sect or
denomination to another shall ever be established by law, nor shall any
religious test be required as a qualification for any office or trust, under
this State; and all religious societies in this State, whether incorporate or
unincorporate, shall at all times have the exclusive right of electing their
public teachers, and contracting with them for their support and maintenance.
Article IX, section
1
Every person elected or appointed to either of the places
or offices provided in this Constitution, and every person elected, appointed,
or commissioned to any judicial, executive, military or other office under this
State, shall, before entering on the discharge of the duties of that place or
office, take and subscribe the following oath or affirmation: "I, _____ do
swear, that I will support the Constitution of the United States and of this
State, so long as I shall continue a citizen thereof. So help me God."
Alternative affirmation. "I _____ do swear, that I will faithfully discharge, to
the best of my abilities, the duties incumbent on me as _____ according to the
Constitution and laws of the State. So help me God." Provided, that an
affirmation in the above forms may be substituted, when the person shall be
conscientiously scrupulous of taking and subscribing an
oath.