Amalia – The Establishment Clause of the First Amendment

Video

Written Component

The Establishment Clause of the Bill of Rights was an agreement of the populous that there should be no federally established church. This decision was reached because before the revolution the Church of England was federally mandated in the southern colonies, while the northern colonies had their Puritan establishments. These different establishments bred dissenters, who were often punished for preaching without a license or refusing to pay taxes to a church they disagreed with. The topic of religion caused conflict in the years before the revolution, dividing the people of this new country instead of bringing them together under one previously imagined, now real, community and shared identity.

The Establishment Clause of the Bill of Rights is commonly understood to have prohibited the government from establishing a state-mandated or federal religion for the nation, effectively separating church and state in the United States. 

This clause has been publicly understood to have separated the church and state in the United States, however many people have had interpretations of this clause as it regards government funding and government-sponsored prayer. Many of the matters of debate that spawn from this clause connect to religion and how it should interact with public education, all according to how the courts interpret the constitution. In relation to government funding, some argue the government must remain neutral between religious and non-religious institutions that provide education or other social services. Others argue that taxpayer funds shouldn’t be given to religious institutions if they might be used to further religious ideas because it violates the separation between church and state that the clause set in place. Through Everson v. Board of Education (1947) and Board of Education v. Allen (1968) all students of religious schools gained access to transportation and textbook funds. As well, Rosenberger v. University of Virginia (1995) deemed it unconstitutional under free speech and free exercise principles to exclude otherwise eligible recipients from government assistance because their activity is religious in nature. On the topic of government-sanctioned prayer the courts determined it unconstitutional for public schools to lead students in religious activities, even voluntary in Engel v. Vitale (1962) and Abington School District v. Schempp (1963). These decisions, though controversial to much of the public, were not to the Justices: it would have been seen as government sponsored religion which goes against the Establishment Clause’s separation between church and state.

The Establishment Clause protects citizens rights to practicing their religion freely, without persecution, also ensuring that the government of the United States isn’t biased towards certain religions. This clause ensures that the obligatory religion that the colonists experienced under the monarchy could not happen in their new nation. The Establishment Clause also protects those facing religious persecution. With religious tolerance being written as an amendment to the Constitution, America became a place of refuge for those experiencing religious oppression; many Jewish people in the early 20th century who fled pogroms (planned massacres of Jewish people in eastern Europe) were able to make a safe life for themselves and their families in the United States. The religious tolerance that the Establishment Clause implemented has had a long lasting impact on the peoples and cultures that make up America to this day as well as how cases pertaining to religion are handled in federal Courts.

---

Tags: abington-school-district-v-schempp, amalia, amalia-locker-olesker, amalia-the-establishment-clause-of-the-first-amendment, amendment, board-of-education-v-allen, church, clause, engel-v-vitale, establishment, establishment-clause, everson-v-board-of-education, first, first-amendment, freedom-of-religion, immigration, locker-olesker, of, pogroms, refuge, religion, religious-persecution, rosenberger-v-university-of-virginia, separation-between-church-and-state, state, the