In 1992, the Court ruled in Lee v. Weisman that prayers at public school commencements are an impermissible establishment of religion: "The lessons of the First Amendment are as urgent in the modern world as the 18th Century when it was written. One timeless lesson is that if citizens are subjected to state-sponsored religious exercises, the State disavows its own duty to guard and respect that sphere of inviolable conscience and belief which is the mark of a free people," wrote Justice Kennedy for the majority. He dismissed as unacceptable the cruel idea that a student should forfeit her own graduation in order to be free from such an establishment of religion.
Our founders wisely adopted a secular constitution, the first to derive its powers from "We, the People" and the consent of the governed, rather than claiming divine authority. They knew from the experience of religious persecution, witch hunts and religious discrimination in the Thirteen Colonies, and from the bloody history left behind in Europe, that the surest path to tyranny was to entangle church and state. That is why they adopted a secular constitution whose only references to religion are exclusionary, such as that there shall be no religious test for public office (Art. VI). There were no prayers offered at the Constitutional Convention, which shows their intent to separate religion from secular affairs.
"There is no such source and cause of strife, quarrel, fights, malignant opposition, persecution, and war, and all evil in the state, as religion. Let it once enter our civil affairs, our government would soon be destroyed. Let it once enter our common schools, they would be destroyed."
- Supreme Court of Wisconsin, Weiss v. District Board, March 18, 1890
"The purpose of separation of church and state is to keep forever from these shores the ceaseless strife that has soaked the soil of Europe in blood for centuries." -James Madison
Who does not see that the same authority which can establish Christianity in exclusion of all other religions may establish, with the same ease, any particular sect of Christians in exclusion of all other sects? That the same authority which can force a citizen to contribute threepence only of his property for the support of any one establishment may force him to conform to any other establishment in all cases whatsoever? (James Madison, "A Memorial and Remonstrance," addressed to the General Assembly of the Commonwealth of Virginia, 1785; from George Seldes, ed., The Great Quotations, Secaucus, New Jersey: The Citadel Press, pp. 459-460. According to Edwin S. Gaustad, Faith of Our Fathers: Religion and the New Nation, San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1987, pp. 39 ff., Madison's "Remonstrance" was instrumental in blocking the multiple establishment of all denominations of Christianity in Virginia.)
"Leave the matter of religion to the family altar, the church, and the private school, supported entirely by private contributions. Keep the church and state forever separate."
- Ulysses S. Grant, "The President's Speech at Des Moines" (1875)
Thomas Jefferson, author of the sweeping Virginia Statute of Religious Freedom, stating that no citizen "shall be compelled to frequent or support any religious worship, place, or ministry whatsoever..." and that to "compell a man to furnish contributions of money for the propagation of [religious] opinions which he disbelieves is sinful and tyrannical."
"I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should make no law 'respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,' thus building a wall of separation between church and state."
- President Thomas Jefferson, 1802 letter to the Baptists of Danbury, Connecticut
Jefferson's Danbury letter has been cited favorably by the Supreme Court many times. In its 1879 Reynolds v. U.S. decision the high court said Jefferson's observations "may be accepted almost as an authoritative declaration of the scope and effect of the [First] Amendment."
Supreme Court Cases Opposing Religious Worship in Schools
McCollum v. Board of Education, 333 U.S. 203, 212 (1948).Struck down religious instruction in public schools. The case involved school-sponsored religious instruction in which the sole nonreligious student, Jim McCollum, was placed in detention and persecuted by schoolmates in Champaign, Illinois.
Tudor v. Board of Education of Rutherford, 14 J.N. 31 (1953), cert. denied 348 U.S. 816 (1954).Let stand a lower court ruling that the practice of allowing volunteers to distribute Gideon Bibles at public school was unconstitutional.
Engel v. Vitale, 370 U.S. 421 (1962).Declared prayers in public school unconstitutional.
Abington Township School District v. Schempp, 374. U.S. 203 (1963).Declared unconstitutional devotional Bible reading and recitation of the Lord's Prayer in public schools.
Epperson v. Arkansas, 393 U.S., 97, 104 (1968).Struck down state law forbidding schools to teach the science of evolution.
Stone v. Graham, 449 U.S. 39 (1980).Declared unconstitutional the posting of the Ten Commandments in classrooms.
Wallace v. Jaffree, 472 U.S. 38, 72 (1985).Overturned law requiring daily "period of silence not to exceed one minute... for meditation or daily prayer."
Jager v. Douglas County School District, 862 F.2d 824 (11th Cir.), Cert. den. 490 U.S. 1090 (1989).Let stand a lower court ruling in Georgia that pre-game invocations at high school football games are unconstitutional.
Lee v. Weisman, 120 L.E. 2d 467/ 112 S.C.T. 2649 (1992).Ruled prayers at public school graduations an impermissible establishment of religion.
Berger v. Rensselaer, 982 F.2d, 1160 (7th Cir.) Cert. denied. 124 L.E. 2d 254 (1993).Let stand ruling barring access to Gideons to pass out bibles in Indiana schools.
Santa Fe Independent School District v. Doe, 530 U.S. 290 (2000).Barred student-led prayers at public school functions.
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