Written by Don Byrd
The news today and this weekend includes lots of coverage anticipating Wednesday’s U.S. Supreme Court argument in Town of Greece v. Galloway, the Court’s first inquiry into government prayer in 30 years. (See a link to the BJC’s brief in the case here; a podcast of BJC counsel discussing their view of the case is here!)
The Atlantic’s Garrett Epps emphasizes a point similar to a central argument in the BJC’s brief: that a prayer in a local government meeting is different from one opening the Senate, where citizens may be observers but are not participants.
The NYTimes editorial board argues “there are many ways to solemnize official functions” without sending a message to citizens of a different faith that they are “outsiders.”
LATimes coverage notes that many on the Court seem ready to overturn or significantly weaken the “endorsement test,” which finds a violation of church-state separation where a reasonable person would interpret government action as endorsing one particular religious viewpoint.
SCOTUSBlog’s Lyle Denniston previews the case, suggesting the Court may not abandon the endorsement test, but limit its application in the context of legislative prayer.
The Washington Post’s Robert Barnes points to the argument on the other side that the prayers in this case implicate the coercion test, which seems to have a fan in Justice Anthony Kennedy.
McClatchy’s piece finds interest in the Obama Administration’s support of the defendants in urging the Court to uphold the prayer policy.
The American Prospect’s Amelia Thomson Deveaux warns that the Court’s ruling in this case could “throw out a decades-old protection against government-sponsored religious speech.
You can read my take – and find links to videos of the prayers at issue – here.
