Religion and Politics ch11
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Transcript of Religion and Politics ch11
RELIGION AND THE
AMERICAN
CONSTITUTIONAL
EXPERIMENT Chapter 11
Religious Organizations and the Law
Religion and the Law
Courts and commentators frequently break the
First Amendment into two parts:
Free exercise
No establishment
Instead, they should be viewing the religion
provisions of the First Amendment as working
together, animated by the underlying six
principles of religious liberty.
Areas of Constitutional
Investigation
The three areas of constitutional investigation
are:
1. The free exercise clause
2. The establishment clause
3. The notion that there must be space between
religious organizations and the civil
government.
Religious Polity and Structures
Religious groups organize themselves in two
important ways simultaneously:
1. Religious groups voluntarily structure
themselves internally in ways that conform to
their religious beliefs.
2. Religious groups are required to structure
themselves in legally sanctioned form to
enjoy the benefits of legal status.
Religious Structures
Polity generally refers to the manner in which
individual believers from a religious body.
Since the 19th century the Supreme Court has
suggested that there are two forms of religious
bodies:
1. Congregational
2. Hierarchical
Legal Structures
A religious organization has a constitutional right
to define itself as a legal entity but the
boundaries of that right are ill defined.
Religious groups need proper legal status:
to enter binding contracts
to sue and be sued
to hold real property
to limit their liability
Religious Property Disputes
The Supreme Court’s earliest cases on religion were based on federal common law, not on the First Amendment directly.
Two themes emerged from church property cases:
1. Religious groups must be treated equally with other legal associations.
2. Religious groups must be treated differently from other organizations.
Equal Treatment (1815-1914)
Terrett v. Taylor (1815)
Goesele v. Bimeler (1852)
Baker v. Nachtrieb (1856)
Speidel v. Henrici (1887)
Schwartz v. Duss (1902)
Order of St. Benedict v. Steinhauser (1914)
Deference (1872-1976)
Watson v. Jones (1872)
Bouldin v. Alexander (1872)
Gonzales v. Roman Catholic Archbishop (1929)
Kedroff v. Saint Nicholas Cathedral (1952)
Presbyterian Church v. Hull Church (1969)
Maryland and Virginia Eldership of Churches of
God v. Church of God at Sharpsburg (1969)
Serbian Orthodox Diocese v. Milivojevich (1976)
Neutral Principles (1979-)
The Court has defined the boundaries in which
civil courts may operate rather than first
defining the scope of the right possessed by
the religious groups themselves.
Jones v. Wolf (1979)
Employment, Taxation, and More
The lack of definition of the rights of religious organizations leads to difficulties in a number of areas besides church property:
1. Disputes within the employment context
2. Questions about how and when religious organizations can partner with the government in providing social services
3. Whether a government may or must grant tax benefits.
Employment
In the previous court cases, the constitutional
principle that religious organizations are
entitled to manage their own internal affairs
without government interference prevailed.
In addition to the constitutional guarantees in
employment cases, legislatures often exempt
religious employers from civil rights laws in
hiring.
Social Services
The question of the extent to which
government may partner with religious
organizations in providing social services has
become increasingly important.
Based on precedents, the legislative and
executive branches have recently been
expanding the collaboration between religious-
based organizations and government.
Taxation
Although plausible to contend that religious
organizations have a constitutional right to be
exempt from taxation, the standard treatment
is that exemptions are permissible but not
required.
Generally, religious organizations are exempt
from taxation, but there are exemptions:
Bob Jones University v. United States (1983)
Frontier Issues
Issues of marriage and divorce raise
fundamental questions about the scope of
authority of religious organizations and the civil
state.
In the past decade, issues of civil and criminal
liability for religious organizations have come
to the fore.