Law Commons^™

Top Court Won't Block Town Prayers, Richard Garnett

Richard W Garnett

Contribution to CNN Opinion by Rick Garnett. Richard Garnett says predicting court decisions is risky, but the odds are the court won't overturn public meeting prayers.

Praying In Greece, Gerard Bradley

Gerard V. Bradley

Contribution by Gerry Bradley in The Public Discourse. Judicial precedent, historical awareness, and the very nature of prayer all make it clear: legislators have the right to begin their assemblies with a prayer. The Supreme Court is hearing oral argument today in Greece v. Galloway, a case about lawmakers who begin their assemblies with prayer. The dispute has nothing to do with the financially beleaguered Aegean republic, even though one of the prayers at issue hailed Athena and Apollo. This Greece is a town in upstate New York, near Rochester. In 1999, the town began to open its Board meetings …

Board Meeting Prayer Bound For Supreme Court In Church-State Case, Richard Garnett

Richard W Garnett

ABC News quoted Rick Garnett in the article by Ariane de Vogue. Richard Garnett, an expert on church-state issues at the Notre Dame Law School says, “At the heart of this new case is whether the court should stick with a relatively bright-line rule that treats legislative prayers as presumptively permissible, given their long use in our country, or whether the court should move to more of an all-things-considered inquiry that treats such prayers like Christmas displays and the like.”

Supreme Court To Hear Case On Separating Church And State, Gerard Bradley

Gerard V. Bradley

Gerard Bradley was quoted in the Los Angeles Times article Supreme Court to hear new case on religion in public lifeby David G. Savage on November 2, 2013. Notre Dame Law professor Gerard Bradley thinks justices may be ready to "reject or seriously modify the 'endorsement' test."

Legislative Prayer Gets Supreme Court Review, Richard Garnett

Richard W Garnett

Rick Garnett was quoted in the Associated Press article by MARK SHERMAN

The article was also published in

Wall Street Journal, Businessweek, NPR. NBC News, Fox News, Yahoo! News

Richard Garnett, a University of Notre Dame law professor and former Supreme Court clerk, said it is likely that the court will reverse the appeals court and that a narrow ruling of the sort sought by the administration could cause some liberal justices to join their conservative colleagues.

But because the case can be resolved narrowly, Garnett said it probably is not one the justices will use to order judges to …

Supreme Court To Hear New Case On Religion In Public Life, Richard Garnett

Richard W Garnett

Rick Garnett was quoted in the Washington Post article.

Against this “messy” backdrop, said Richard Garnett, a law professor at Notre Dame, the court’s view on legislative prayer “is actually one of the clearer areas in the court’s Establishment Clause” jurisprudence.

Just Like A Prayer?, Richard Garnett

Richard W Garnett

Rick Garnett was quoted in The American Prospect article Just Like a Prayer? on November 1, 2013 Quotations below: But Rick Garnett, a professor of law and political science at the University of Notre Dame, says that’s a stretch, even for Kennedy. “Sure, there are children who come to municipal government meetings, but there are a whole lot of tourists and children who come to Congress,” he says. “I don’t think the court will want to take that vague idea of peer pressure as coercion and expand it beyond the school context.” From Garnett’s perspective, this is a good thing. …