Religious Liberty Paper

Religion is one of the most controversial issues in society today. The concern of allowing prayer in schools is an on-going debate and has resulted in numerous lawsuits. Religious school clubs, after school activities, curriculums, and moments of silence during school are just a few of the court cases that judges have administered. People in favor of prayer in schools believe that their children can only learn certain values through religious practice. On the other hand, an individual against religious practice in schools views this issue as an infringement on his or her children’s rights as Americans.

James Madison and Thomas Jefferson are two of the seven key founding fathers of the United States. The motive of the founders of the U.S. was to establish religious freedom in the colonies; therefore, religion was of importance to them. When the policy of the separation of church and state was enacted by the founding fathers through the Constitution, it meant that under a secular government, religious freedom would always be protected. Issues such as the freedom to practice one’s religion arose in the earlier colonies and the separation of church and states prevents these issues from occurring again. The separation of church and state protects the rights of all and ensures religious freedom. This policy has proven to be nothing but a

In response to the Supreme Court’s ruling in the Santa Fe Independent School District V. Doe (SFISD V. Doe) case, Chief Justice Rehnquist commented, “It [the ruling] bristles with hostility to all things religious in public life” (“United”). Separating religion and state has always been a matter of concern for the United States, as shown by the Establishment Clause in the First Amendment of our constitution. Although there have been many cases revolving around the relationship between the church and the state, SFISD V. Doe is among the most notable. By examining the background, reflecting on the decision, and analyzing the impact of the SFISD V. Doe case,

The case of Wallace v. Jaffree calls into question the constitutionality of an Alabama statute that authorized teachers to lead a one-minute period of silence for “meditation or voluntary” prayer in all public schools. Ishmael Jaffree, the parent of three students in the Mobile County Public School system filed a complaint that two of his three children had been “subjected to various acts of religious indoctrination,” as a result of Alabama statute 16-1-20.1 and asked for an injunction prohibiting Mobile County schools from “maintaining or allowing the maintenance of regular religious prayer services.” The purpose of Jaffree’s complaint was to prohibit the devotional services occurring in his children’s school and the consequent mockery of his children that occurred when they refused to recite the prayers to “Almighty God” (Stevens, 40). This type of law in Alabama public schools was not the first of its kind. Prior to statute 6-11-20.1, Alabama passed law 16-1-20 authorizing one minute of silence in public schools for meditation. After the authorization of statute 16-1-20.1 came 16-1-20.2, which allowed teachers to lead “willing students” in a prayer (Stevens, 40).

When discussing the intertwining of church and state; soul liberty and freedom from religious belief, we must recognize that freedom and faith were at one point complementary ideas. Faith was once the foundation for freedom and vice versa. The Declaration of Independence clearly states, "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal and endowed with certain inalienable rights." With these words from the Declaration of Independence, our founding fathers set up their vision of what this country would come to be. Among those rights, which are deemed “inalienable”, is the right of religious liberty. (Neumann, 1990: p. 241)

The First Amendment is part of the Bill of Rights. The Bill of Rights is our rights as citizens living in the United States of America. In this paper I will look at three provisions to the First Amendment, highlighting one case for each provision. Included are one case to discuss freedom of speech, one case to discuss separation of church and state and one case to discuss freedom of association.

Thomas Jefferson and James Madison cowrote "The Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom" in 1786 in an effort to end state funded religion. The struffle was fought by religious leaders who requested a state tax to fund their institutions. They feared that without a state tax moral fabric of society would disintegrate. This bill ended the feud between religion and state, and created the precedent for religious freedom in the United States. "Conventional wisdom teaches that secularization was an essential ingredient in the cultural background for liberal democracy. To have liberal pluralistic democracy, it is said, we in the West first had to break away from the religious worldviews that were characteristic of pre-modern feudalism, aristocracy, and monarchy" (Mcconnell, 2003, p.943).

Freedom is being breached all over the U.S and most of it is being taken away from the press. Sure the Patriot Act is killing everyone's privacy in secrecy all over the US, but journalists and reporters are being put in jail right and left. The government has infringed on their rights in a way that should not be with the first amendment. It seems like the more people let the government do, the more steps the government takes to take first amendment rights from people. For instance the secret spying on people from government organizations, the quiet protest of a man who was brutally beat and sent to jail, the beginning of punishment comparison to a communist country, and the severe punishment of a man who would did

In chapter, five there are several points. However the biggest points are if the colonists should be independent from Britain, the colonists reaction to the laws and acts made by the British Empire, and the rights of the colonists. These points summarize the contents of chapter five of “Voices of Freedom” and “Give Me Liberty”. The articles in voices of freedom that are arguing the primary points the first article is the “Virginia Resolutions on the Stamp Act (1765)”. This article is about Virginia’s House of Burgesses making resolutions to defend their liberty they decided to approve four of these resolutions and rejected three. The next article is “New York Workingmen Demand a Voice in the Revolutionary Struggle (1770)”. This article is

Her mother, who converted to Christian Science, had passed down the religion to her daughter, who is now a firm supporter for exemption from health care. However, an opposing view from Kristen A. Feemster, “‘Parents may be free to become martyrs themselves, but it does not follow they are free … to make martyrs of their children,’ the Supreme Court ruled in 1944.” This can be seen in Howell’s example of her mother’s miracle and her new passed on religion to her children. While it was not forced upon Howell to believe in Christian Science, her mother passed down her mindset of miracles being able to happen if she prayed for God’s help. These parents are able to believe in various aspects in religion; however, this does not mean they should strongly enforce that their children to be well versed in their parents’ beliefs when they have so little knowledge about their parent’s religious beliefs and the rest of the world’s beliefs.

Massachusetts: “The right to practice religion freely does not include liberty to expose the community or the child to communicable disease or the latter to ill health or death.”

Currently, Idaho is one out of only six states that do not have any laws that hold parents accountable when children lose their lives due to their poor decision. A bill passed in 1972 made it so child injury is not punishable, when the parents have religious ideologies behind it (Naylor). Lately, there has been a push to make a change, as many see the danger in this exemption. Children must be protected by Idaho’s law, or more lives will be lost; we simply cannot stand for that. It is imperative that Idaho enacts legislation that prevents parents from having the ability to declare religious freedom to avoid punishment for manslaughter or neglect.

The controversial and historic precedent set by the high court has once and for all removed the burden of providing contraceptives to employees by corporations. One of the many challenges of this paper is to delineate between the 1993 Congressional Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) and the First Amendment Free Exercise Claus as both were paramount to the most recent ruling. Thankfully, establishing what is applicable to whom and why has become less arduous concerning religious views but conversely has the potential for further infringements.

There are several reasons why I have the religious affiliation that I do. My membership, unlike that of so many, has very little to do with the choices my friends and family have made. My decision was based on reason and personal experiences. While some may say that these things are both easily influenced by parents and peers, in my case I have parents of different faith and therefore have less direct influence from them.

I never thought to be a Christian leader. As a matter of fact, I am a person who did not know about God for 26 years. I was the center of my life, and there was no room for God to enter. Even when I was attending church service, I was trying not to be exposed to other church people. In other words, I was the kind of person who was afraid to walk into a life of faith. However, in the past three years, God has changed me in many ways, and showed me so many miraculous things. And, finally here I am. Being a Christian leader seems the most challenging job in the world. I am working as the chairman of a youth ministry, and walking on the path to be a church leader. When God called me to work for the