US Supreme Court Banned ‘God’ in Schools - long back in 1963
A BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE RULING
The Supreme Court’s June 1963 decision on Bible reading and recitation of the Lord’s Prayer in the public schools (School District of Abington Township, Pennsylvania v. Shempp et al. and Murray v. Curlett) has implications for school districts in all parts of the country.
The Court’s decision and some information about events leading up to it:
The Schempp case involved parents who objected to the practice in Abington Township schools of opening each day with reading of verses from the Bible and recitation of the Lord’s Prayer. The exercises were carried out in accordance with a Pennsylvania statute that stated
At least ten verses from the Holy Bible shall be read without comment, at the opening of each public school on each school day. Any child shall be excused from such Bible reading, or attending such Bible reading, upon written request of his parent or guardian.
The attorney for the Schempps contended that such exercises were religious in nature and violated the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment, which reads “Congress shall make law respecting an establishment of religion. . . .” He also noted that the First Amendment was made applicable to the states by the Due Process Clause in the Fourteenth Amendment.
Attorneys for the Abington Township Schools contended that the exercises were nonseclular in nature and did not seek to establish any preference for one religion over another.
They also contended that to deprive all students of the right to say prayers or read the Bible would be in violation of the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment. This clause forbids Congress from making any law that would prohibit the free exercise of religion.
The case was previously argued before a special three-judge Federal District Court, in Philadelphia, which said that the opening exercise was “a religious ceremony and was intended by the State to be one.” The lower court therefore held unanimously that the exercise are unconstitutional. Attorneys for the school board then appealed to the Supreme Court for a reversal.
In Murray v. Curlett, a Baltimore mother challenged the constitutionality of a Baltimore board of education rule that provided:
Each school, either collectively or in a class, shall be opened by the reading without comment, of a chapter of the holy Bible and/or the use of the Lord’s Prayer. The Douay [Catholic] version may be used by those who prefer it . . . Any child shall be excused from participating in the opening exercises or from attending the opening exercises upon the written request of his parent or guardian.
Attorneys for Mrs. Murray also argued that this rule was in violation of the Establishment clause as it applied to the states by the Fourteenth Amendment. they argued, as did the attorney for the Schempps, that allowing students to be excused from the exercises upon written request was no less a restriction of freedom of conscience than if the student were compelled to participate. They testified that Mrs. Murray’s son had been physically abused by other students the first time he was excused.
Attorneys for the board of education argued that the purpose of the morning exercises was not to promote religion but to promote moral values.
The case eventually reached the Maryland Supreme Court, where the Justices, in a 4-3 decision, upheld the constitutionality of the Baltimore board of education rule. The decision was appealed to the Supreme Court, where it was combined with the Schempp case because of the similarity between the two.
The Supreme Court’s Decision
On June 17, 1963, the Court decided, by an 8-1 majority, that the required religious practices of Bible reading and recitation of the Lord’s Prayer and the laws requiring them are unconstitutional.
Justice Clark, in his majority opinion, noted that past cases involving the First Amendment the Court had held that the state must
“be a neutral in its relations with groups of religious believers and nonbelievers; it does not require the state to be their adversary. State power is no more to be used so as to handicap religions than it is to favor them.”
Toward the end of his opinion, Justice Clark said:
The place of religion in our society is an exalted one, achieved through a long tradition of reliance on the home, the church, and the inviolable citadel of the individual heart and mind. We have come to recognize through bitter experience that it is not within the power of government to invade that citadel, whether its purpose or effect be to aid or oppose, to advance or retard. In the relationship between man and religion, the State is firmly committed to a position of neutrality.
In answer to arguments that the decision would establish in the schools a “religion of secularism,” Justice Clark said:
We agree of course that the State may not establish a “religion of secularism,” in the sense of affirmatively opposing or showing hostility to religion, thus “preferring those who believe in no religion over those who do believe.” . . . We do not agree, however, that this decision in any sense has that effect.
As the following paragraph indicates, he made it clear that the study, of religion, as distinguished from religious exercises, is permitted.
It certainly may be said that the Bible is worthy of study for its literary and historic qualities. Nothing we have said here indicates such study of the Bible or of religion, when presented objectively as part of a secular program of education, may not be effected consistent with the First Amendment.
Prior to the Supreme Court’s decision, laws requiring Bible reading in public schools has been tested in courts in twenty-three states. In seventeen they were upheld, but courts in Illinois, Louisiana, Nebraska, South Dakota, Washington, and Wisconsin declared Bible reading exercises in the schools unconstitutional. The Illinois decision dates back to 1910.
The Supreme Court itself, in a decision (Engle v. Vitale) handed down a little more than a year ago, declared unconstitutional the recitation in New York schools of a Prayer composed by the State Board of Regents. At that time, the Court said, in effect, an official body of the state has no business composing prayers. Until the decision on the Schempp and Murray cases, however, the Court left unanswered questions about the constitutionality of laws or rulings requiring or permitting Bible reading and/or recitation of the Lord’s Prayer. Such laws or rulings existed in twenty-nine state at the time of the recent decision.
It is to be expected that laws in other states similar to those on Bible reading and the Lord’s Prayer which the Court has declared invalid will not be upheld if their constitutionality is tested.
The Murray Vs. Curlett case :
While the famous 1963 Supreme Court decision Murray v. Curlett helped to end the unconstitutional practice of mandatory prayer recitation in public schools, it also gave rise to profound distortions of American history by school prayer advocates. One example of this is the notion that “Before that Atheist Madalyn Murray threw God out of the classroom”, prayer in school was a well-established American institution which established a religious and moral tone throughout the culture.
Prior to the American Revolution, various religious bodies enjoyed a unique position of power. Madalyn O’Hair noted in her book “Freedom Under Siege” that “Reading Colonial history immediately prior to the Revolution, specifically the theological clashes between the states, one finds that the Founding Fathers had become completely disenchanted with each colony’s insistence upon a particular sect established and supported financially by tax funds and the body politic.”
These “established” churches had enormous power. One had to support the church through taxes, and often had to be a member in order to exercise various rights and privileges, such as even owning property. It was no surprise, then, that “come the Revolution”, a process of “disestablishment” began. The churches were taken off the social welfare rolls and were no longer “established” as the official religious body of a region. Naturally, minority religious groups supported the idea; but many churches opposed the disestablishment process, seeing the demise of their privileged status in the new Republic.
Virginia led the way with its Declaration of Rights, which was enacted in June of 1776. Pennsylvania, Delaware and New Jersey soon followed, and in 1777, New York, North Carolina and Georgia disestablished their respective churches. Massachusetts waited until 1833.
After the wave of disestablishment of the official state churches, many states — the original thirteen and the new territories which joined the United States — took an ambiguous view of official religion. Most states, for instance, did not mandate religious exercise in public schools. In fact, by the 1960′s, only five states actually had laws which required Bible recitation in their public schools.
Seven other states permitted Bible reading, but allowed for students who did not wish to participate to be excused. Even that practice, of course, violated the rights of non-participating students (both religious and non-believer), and courts in 11 states ruled this prayer formula to be unconstitutional. These legal decisions cover the period of 1890-1910.
The period of 1910 to 1930 witnessed vigorous attempts to reverse this trend, however, and institute school prayer. Groups such as the National Reform Association succeeded in having laws passed in 17 states which made some provision for prayer and Bible recitation in schools. The rationale was that this religious exercise would “benefit” society. Sometimes, prayer ritual was linked to other invasive movements, including the Prohibitionist craze and other bizarre social experiments. Even so, practices varied considerably from state to state. In some jurisdictions, the option of whether or not to institute prayer was left to local school systems.
Contrary to the assertion of school prayer supporters, the practice has only limited precedent throughout the more than two centuries our Republic has existed. It was never universal — just as there has never been a time when the majority of the American population consisted of regular church-goers. Even where school prayer did exist, it turned out to be a source of social conflict and divisiveness, often with various religious sects arguing with each other over whose prayer should be recited, or whose Bible should be used for the regular devotions.
The Murray v. Curlett case was actually the first of its kind — it addressed not just the question of “religious liberty” for believers, but the notion of liberties for Atheists. Subsequent cases, though, have also been fought on behalf of an important American principle — the total, absolute separation of government and religion.
In this respect, all of these separationist cases are part of a larger continuum, one which stretches back to the founding days of our Republic when men such as Jefferson and Madison began the task of “disestablishing” state religions.