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re: Arkansas State Football team forced to remove Christian crosses from helmets
Posted on 9/12/14 at 12:41 pm to Vols&Shaft83
Posted on 9/12/14 at 12:41 pm to Vols&Shaft83
LINK
The list of rulings against any establishment of any religion in any form of a governmental institution if you would care to read more. Basically these court rulings disallow crosses to be put on the helmets
quote:
The word 'religion' is not defined in the Constitution. We must go elsewhere, therefore, to ascertain its meaning, and nowhere more appropriately, we think, than to the history of the times in the midst of which the provision was adopted." The court found that the leaders in advocating and formulating the constitutional guarantee of religious liberty were James Madison and Thomas Jefferson. Quoting the "separation" paragraph from Jefferson's letter to the Danbury Baptists, the court concluded that, "coming as this does from an acknowledged leader of the advocates of the measure, it may be accepted almost as an authoritative declaration of the scope and effect of the amendment thus secured."
quote:
The centrality of the "separation" concept to the Religion Clauses of the Constitution was made explicit in Everson v. Board of Education...This was the first case in which the court applied the Establishment Clause to the laws of a state, having interpreted the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment as applying the Bill of Rights to the states as well as the federal legislature. Citing Jefferson, the court concluded that "The First Amendment has erected a wall between church and state. That wall must be kept high and impregnable. We could not approve the slightest breach."
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In 1962, the Supreme Court addressed the issue of officially-sponsored prayer or religious recitations in public schools. In Engel v. Vitale...determined it unconstitutional for state officials to compose an official school prayer and require its recitation in public schools, even when the prayer is non-denominational and students may excuse themselves from participation. As the Court stated:
The petitioners contend, among other things, that the state laws requiring or permitting use of the Regents' prayer must be struck down as a violation of the Establishment Clause because that prayer was composed by governmental officials as a part of a governmental program to further religious beliefs
The list of rulings against any establishment of any religion in any form of a governmental institution if you would care to read more. Basically these court rulings disallow crosses to be put on the helmets
2
Posted on 9/12/14 at 12:44 pm to tamctshirt
quote:
tamctshirt
Not of that addresses:
quote:
True, but what if the helmet stickers were purchased by a team member's parents? Or were purchased by a private entity which donated them to the football program?
Are the players not allowed to memorialize a teammate as they see fit if the helmet stickers were not purchased by the university?
Posted on 9/12/14 at 1:48 pm to tamctshirt
quote:
"The First Amendment has erected a wall between church and state. That wall must be kept high and impregnable. We could not approve the slightest breach."
The biggest problem with quoting Jefferson's letter as authority on the meaning of the 1st Amendment establishment clause (particularly as applied to the states via the 14th) is that the comments were made in the context of an understanding of the constitution that limited government. The Federal government had no power to establish schools, therefore the separation of schools and religion (at that time joined at the hip) would have been unthinkable. It is the injection of government into every aspect of our lives that makes the current application of the establishment clause so offensive. Thanks FDR.
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