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Full-Text Articles in Law
Separation Of Church And State In The United States: Lost In Translation, Carol J. Greenhouse
Separation Of Church And State In The United States: Lost In Translation, Carol J. Greenhouse
Indiana Journal of Global Legal Studies
In this article, the absence of an American equivalent to the French word laĭcité becomes an ethnographic opening to an exploration of the church-state divide in the U.S. context. Drawing on classic social theory, sociological accounts, and current events, I suggest that the constitutional separation of church and state-in addition to whatever it may mean in legal terms-also expresses a cultural proposition. Specifically, the separation of church and state posits a dual role for local communities as both the source of federal power (through representative government) and the foundation of its moral authority. The latter role can be sustained only …
Religious Exemptions, Formal Neutrality, And Laïcité, Frederick Mark Gedicks
Religious Exemptions, Formal Neutrality, And Laïcité, Frederick Mark Gedicks
Indiana Journal of Global Legal Studies
Rights to free exercise in the United States are governed by a doctrine of formal neutrality, which seems to resemble the French doctrine of la'cit6. This resemblance tempts one to conclude that the doctrinal regimes of religious liberty in the United States and France are also essentially the same. Despite their superficial resemblance, however formal neutrality and laĭcité generate regimes of religious liberty that are substantially, even radically, different. Notwithstanding conceptually similar organizing principles, there is a significant difference in the substance of religious liberty in the United States and France owing to very different conceptions of the proper role …