Freedom of Religion in the United States

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Freedom of Religion is a unalienable right and constitutional doctrine guaranteeing the ability of the individual to freely believe and practice religious principles according to his or her conscience.

In the United States, freedom of religion is a constitutionally guaranteed right provided in the religion clause of the First Amendment. Freedom of religion is also closely associated with separation of church and state, originally created by Thomas Jefferson.

The modern legal concept of religious freedom as the union of freedom of belief and freedom of worship with the absence of any state-sponsored religion, originated in the United States of America.

"Save Freedom of Worship". American World War II poster

Monument honoring the right to worship, Washington, D.C.

[edit] Beginnings

Yale's Avalon project collected documents leading up to the US Constitution and its Bill of Rights with the First Amendment's Freedom of Religion.

[edit] Magna Carta 1215

Following his banishment by King John's and John's pillaging of monasteries, Archbishop Stephen Langdon drew on Henry I's Charter of Liberties to write the Magna Carta that the Barons required King John to sign in return for paying taxes. This began with The Church shall be free.

[edit] English Bill of Rights 1669

Following the Trial of the Seven Bishops, and the King's controversial pro-Catholic policies, Parliament passed the English Bill of Rights in 1669.

[edit] Establishment of Religion

King Henry VIII established the Anglican Church as the Church of England with himself as its head. This resulted in coercive laws. e.g. John Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress was written in prison for an unauthorized religious meeting.

In 1774, the British Parliament passed a law establishing Anglicanism and Roman Catholicism as official religions in the colonies. The American colonies strongly objected. The First Continental Congress immediately sent a letter of protest, declaring that it was:

"[Astonished] that a British Parliament should ever consent to establish ... a religion [Catholicism] that has deluged [England] in blood and dispersed bigotry, persecution, murder, and rebellion through every part of the world."

In the Resolutions of the Continental Congress October 19, 1765, the American Colonists referred back to the Magna Carta and English Bill of rights, insisting on their most essential rights and liberties Of the colonists and holding:

That His Majesty's liege subjects in these colonies, are entitled to all the inherent rights and liberties of his natural born subjects within the kingdom of Great-Britain.

Thomas Jefferson also played a large role in the formation of freedom of religion. He created the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom, which has since been incorporated into the Virginia State Constitution.

[edit] Unalienable Rights

The United States of America was established on foundational principles by the Declaration of Independence:

We hold these truths to be self-evident: That all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; that, to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed;

(based on Thomas Jefferson's draft.)

[edit] The United States Constitution

The early thirteen states' distaste for a national religion was reflected in the Constitution. Article VI states that:

"No religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or Public Trust under the United States."

This statement, however, did not reassure those who feared that the new Constitution would curtail individual liberty and therefore the states quickly ratified the First Amendment. ^[1]

[edit] The First Amendment

The First Amendment of the Constitution begins with two important clauses regarding the establishment of religion; an establishment clause, and a free exercise clause.

[edit] The Establishment Clause

The establishment clause - Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion - prohibits the Federal government from establishing a national church ("religion"). It is interpreted as preventing the government from involving itself in religion. (Thomas Jefferson privately wrote that this is a "wall of separation" between church and state.)

[edit] Supreme Court Rulings

The Supreme Court has consitently held fast to the rule of strict separation of church and state when matters of prayer are involved. In Engel v. Vitale the Court ruled that the recitation in public schools of a twenty-two word nondenomination prayer was unconstitutional. In 1992, the Court ruled that the saying of prayer at a middle school graduation was also unconstitutional, and in 2000 ruled that student-led prayer during high school football games violated the establishment clause.

The Court has therefore tried to determine a way to deal with church/state questions. In 1971 in Lemon v. Kurtzman, the Court created a three part test for laws dealing with religious establishment. This determined that a law was constitutional if it:

1. Had a secular purpose
2. Neither advanced or inhibited religion
3. Did not foster an excessive government entanglement with religion.

However, since the 1980s, the Supreme Court has seemed to sidestep the Lemon test altogether.

In 1981, the Court ruled that a Missouri law prohibiting religious groups from using state university grounds and buildings for religious worship was unconstitutional. As a result, Congress decided in 1984 that this should apply to secondary and primary schools as well, passing the Equal Access Act, which prevents public schools from discriminating against students based on "religious, political, philisophical or other content of the speech at such meetings". In 1990, the Court upheld this law when it ruled that a school board's refusal to allow a Christian Bible club to meet in a public high school classroom violated the act. And in 1993, the Court ruled that religious groups must be allowed to use public schools after hours if the same access is granted to other community groups.

• In 1995, the Supreme Court found that the University of Virginia was unconstitutionally withholding funds from a religious student magazine.
• Agostini v. Felton - In 1997, they approved a New York program that sent public school teachers into parochial schools during school hours to provide remedial education to disadvantaged students.
• Zelman v. Simmons-Harris - the Court concluded that governments can give money to parents to allow them to send their children to private and religious schools, and that this was constitutional because it was neutral toward religion and did not officially sponsor any one religion.

[edit] The Free Exercise Clause

The Free Exercise Clause states that Congress can not prohibit the free exercise of religious practices.

The Supreme Court has consistently held, however, that even though the First Amendment guarantees the right to free exercise, this right is not absolute. For example, in the 1800s, Mormons traditionally practiced polygamy, yet in 1879 the Supreme Court upheld the conviction of a Mormon under a federal law barring polygamy. The Court reasoned that to do otherwise would set precedent for a full range of religious beliefs including those as extreme as human sacrifice. The Court stated that "Laws are made for the government of actions, and while they cannot interfere with mere religious belief and opinions, they may with practices."^{[citation needed]}

The USA has become a nation of many religious institutions which flourish under the freedom of legal protection by local, state and federal governments. This protection is, though, not to be used as cover for illegal activities, as in the case of a defendant who claimed smoking marijuana was part of her religious beliefs and practices:

"Those who seek constitutional protections for their participation in an establishment of religion and freedom to practice its beliefs must not be permitted the special freedoms that this special sanctuary may provide merely by adopting religious nomenclature and cynically using it as a shield to protect them when participating in anti-social conduct that otherwise stands condemned." (U.S. v. Kuch 288 FSup. 439 (1968))

In the Mormon case, The Supreme court interpreted the law as protecting the beliefs of a religion, not the practices. For example, If you were part of a religion that believed in vampirism, the First Amendment would protect your belief in vampirism, but not the practice.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] Early American practices

A copy of a sermon on the Second Coming of Christ, and on the Last Judgment. This sermon was delivered by John Hargrove on December 25th 1804 before both houses of Congress, at the Capitol in the city of Washington.

Despite the contemporary claims that Jefferson and Madison were strict proponents of the concept of separation of church and state as it is currently presented in modern debate, it is a common misconception to assume that religion was not associated with the practice of politics in early American life. In fact, the Religion and the Founding of the American Republic website exhibit at the Library of Congress states,

In fact, the Library of Congress exhibit clearly states that Jefferson apparently had no objection to non-discriminatory religion being practiced in state, but rather he objected ONLY to the formation of a state supported church – such as is practiced by Britain with her official recognition of the Church of England as the state church.^[3]

[edit] State Constitutions

Under the doctrine of Incorporation, the first amendment has been made applicable to the states. Therefore the states must guarantee the freedom of religion in the same way the federal government must.

Many states have freedom of religion established in their constitution, though the exact legal consequences of this right vary for historical and cultural reasons. Most states interpret "freedom of religion" as including the freedom of long-established religious communities to remain intact and not be destroyed. By extension, democracies interpret "freedom of religion" as the right of each individual to freely choose to convert from one religion to another, mix religions, or abandon religion altogether (atheism).

[edit] Freedom of Religion Restoration

Following increasing government involvement in religious matters, Congress passed the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. States then passed corresponding acts. e.g., Missouri passed the Religious Freedom Restoration Act Ch. 1 Sect. 1.302

[edit] References