Written by Don Byrd
[UPDATE: Howard Friedman at Religion Clause has helpfully provided links to Justice Scalia’s opinions on religious clauses and religious issues.]
Tobin Grant and Daniel Bennett today reviewed Justice Antonin Scalia’s church-state views for Religion News Service. Here is an excerpt:
Scalia and other accommodationists agreed that the Establishment Clause prohibits the federal government from, say, supporting a national church. But as far as general support for religion, such as displaying the Ten Commandments in courtrooms or praying in public schools? This is perfectly compatible with the First Amendment.
. . . In McCreary County v. ACLU, the Court ruled against a Ten Commandments display in a Kentucky courtroom, finding the display’s purpose was to advance religion. In a dissenting opinion Scalia said the majority had missed the point of the Establishment Clause: Honoring God and the Ten Commandments was not an endorsement of a particular religion.
He also raised these views in Lee v. Weisman, a case involving prayer at high school graduation ceremonies. Also dissenting in this case, Scalia panned the majority’s reasoning that school officials coerced students into praying as “incoherent,” and not true to an original understanding of the Establishment Clause.
As Grant and Bennett also noted, Justice Scalia spoke to a Louisiana audience just a month ago criticizing the idea that government must remain neutral on matters of religion, a view questioned by the BJC’s Brent Walker in a recent column.
You can read the BJC’s statement on Justice Scalia’s passing here.
