Substantive Law Study Support

Questions for Analysis and Responses

1. Answer the following questions regarding the Seeger case:

a. What was the judicial history of the Seeger case?

Seeger was convicted in the District Court for the Southern District of New York of having refused to submit to induction in the armed forces. He was convicted and the court of appeals reversed.
b. According to the Supreme Court, what should be the test for determining belief in a Supreme Being?
“A sincere and meaningful belief which occupies in the life of its possessor a place parallel to that filled by the orthodox beliefs in God.”
c. How did Seeger describe his belief in a Supreme Being?

Seeger professed “religious belief ” and “religious faith.” He did not disavow any belief “in a relation to a Supreme Being”; indeed he stated that “the cosmic order does, perhaps, suggest a creative intelligence.” He decried the tremendous “spiritual” price man must pay for his willingness to destroy human life.
d. Why was Seeger’s claim denied by the Selective Service Board?

The board denied his claim because it found he did not believe in a “Supreme Being,” interpreting this term to encompass a traditional view of God.
e. How did Congress define “religious training and belief ” as the phrase is used in the Selective Service Act?
“Belief in a relation to a Supreme Being involving duties superior to those arising from any human relation.”

2. Answer the following questions regarding the Allegheny case:

a. Why did the crèche display violate the Establishment Clause?

The crèche endorsed a Christian religious belief and nothing distracted from that endorsement or message. The Court noted the written message, “Glory to God for the birth of Jesus Christ,” and believed that this promoted one religion.
b. Is it all right for government to celebrate Christmas? Explain.

It is all right for government to celebrate Christmas as a cultural event, but not to promote it as a religious holiday.
c. Why did Justice Blackmun think that the menorah did not violate the First Amendment?
The menorah display did not have the prohibited effect of endorsing religion, given its “particular physical setting.” Its combined display with a Christmas tree and a sign saluting liberty does not impermissibly endorse both the Christian and Jewish faiths, but simply recognizes that both Christmas and Chanukah are part of the same winter-holiday season that has attained a secular status in our society. Its proximity to the secular Christmas tree was important.
d. Which Establishment Clause theory did Justices Kennedy, White, and Scalia apply? What was their conclusion?
The requirement of neutrality inherent in the Lemon formulation does not require a relentless extirpation of all contact between government and religion.
Government policies of accommodation, acknowledgement, and support for religion are an accepted part of our political and cultural heritage, and the Establishment Clause permits government some latitude in recognizing the central role of religion in society. Any approach less sensitive to our heritage would border on latent hostility to religion, as it would require government in all its multifaceted roles to acknowledge only the secular, to the exclusion and so to the detriment of the religious.

3. Answer the following questions regarding Committee for Public Education & Religious Liberty v. Nyquist:
a. What type of aid did the state give to religious schools in this case?

There were three types of aid: direct money grants to qualifying nonpublic schools to be used for maintenance and repair of facilities and equipment to ensure the students’ health, welfare, and safety; a tuition reimbursement plan for parents of children attending nonpublic elementary or secondary schools; and tax relief to parents failing to qualify for tuition reimbursement.
b. What did the Supreme Court say about the aid?

The maintenance and repair provisions of the New York statute violated the Establishment Clause because their inevitable effect was to subsidize and advance the religious mission of sectarian schools. The tuition reimbursement grants, if given directly to sectarian schools, would similarly violate the Establishment Clause, and the fact that they were delivered to the parents rather than the schools did not compel a contrary result, as the effect of the aid is unmistakably to provide financial support for nonpublic, sectarian institutions.
The system of providing income tax benefits to parents of children attending New York’s nonpublic schools also violates the Establishment Clause because, like the tuition reimbursement program, it was not sufficiently restricted to assure that it did not have the impermissible effect of advancing the sectarian activities of religious schools.
c. Compare the result in this case with the result in Zelman v. Simmons- Harris.
Zelman reached a different result. The Court noted the following. Both religious and nonreligious schools in the district could participate, as could public schools in adjacent school districts. Because the program was enacted for the valid secular purpose of providing educational assistance to poor children in a demonstrably failing public school system, the question was whether the program nonetheless has the forbidden effect of advancing or inhibiting religion. The Court felt the effect was not forbidden. In discussing Committee for Public Ed. & Religious Liberty v. Nyquist, the Court noted that Nyquist does not govern neutral educational assistance programs that offer aid directly to a broad class of individuals defined without regard to religion.

4. Answer the following questions regarding Van Orden v. Perry.

a. What facts led Justice Breyer to conclude that the Ten Commandment display had a secular purpose?
Justice Breyer stated one must look not only at the text, but also examine how the text is used. He noted, “in certain contexts, a display of the tablets of the Ten Commandments can convey not simply a religious message but also a secular moral message (about proper standards of social conduct). And in certain contexts, a display of the tablets can also convey a historical message (about a historic relation between those standards and the law)—a fact that helps to explain the display of those tablets in dozens of courthouses throughout the nation, including the Supreme Court of the United States. Here the tablets have been used as part of a display that communicates not simply a religious message, but a secular message as well.”
Justice Breyer also believed that placement and setting of the display suggested the state intended the monument message to be nonreligious in nature.
b. What test did Justice Breyer use to analyze whether the display violated the Establishment Clause?
Justice Breyer felt that there was no single test that could be applied to the case. Justice Breyer relied “less upon a literal application of any particular test than upon consideration of the basic purposes of the First Amendment’s Religion Clauses themselves.”

Assignments and Projects

1. Following the format provided in previous chapters brief the case of United States v. Seeger, 380 U.S. 163 (1965)
Judicial History: The trial court convicted Seeger of “draft-dodging.” The appellate court. reversed his conviction and the government appealed.
Facts: Defendant Seeger was drafted into military service and refused to go under the Universal Military Training and Service Act provision that exempted individuals as “conscientious objectors.” These individuals were defined as persons who by reason of their religious training and belief are conscientiously opposed to participation in war in any form. The Act defined “religious training and belief” as “an individual’s belief in a relation to a Supreme Being involved in duties superior to those arising from any human relation, but not including essentially political, sociological, or philosophical views or merely a personal moral code.”
The defendant did not profess a belief in a Supreme Being, but claimed that he had a belief in “goodness and virtue for their own sakes, and a religious faith in a purely ethical creed.”
Issue: Did the defendant meet the requirements of being a conscientious objector, even though his beliefs were not in a Supreme Being?
Holding: Yes, the Court affirmed the decision of the appellate court.

Rationale: The Court determined that a person can meet the requirements of being a conscientious objector even if they do not believe in a Supreme Being, as long as their beliefs are fundamentally equivalent to a traditional belief in a Supreme Being. The Court found that the proper test of religious belief should be whether a given belief “that is sincere and meaningful and occupies a place in the life of its possessor parallel to that filled by the orthodox beliefs in God” qualifies for the conscientious objector exemption.

2. Locate and describe at least three organizations whose purpose is to promote religious freedom.
Student answers will vary. Examples of organizations that promote religious freedom include:
- American Atheists: The organization labors for the “civil liberties of atheists and the total, absolute separation of government and religion.”
- American Civil Liberties Union: “The goal of the ACLU’s work on freedom of religion and belief is to guarantee that all are free to follow and practice their faith —or no faith at all—without governmental influence or interference.”
- Hudson Institute’s Center for Religious Freedom: The institute’s research agenda includes religious freedom.
- The Foundation for Religious Freedom: Seeks to “educate the public as to religious rights, freedoms and responsibilities.”