Religion Law Commons^™

The Priority Of God: A Theory Of Religious Liberty, Michael Stokes Paulsen

Pepperdine Law Review

Professor Paulsen argues that religious freedom only makes entire sense as a constitutional arrangement on the premise that God exists, that God makes actual demands on human loyalty and conduct, and that those demands precede and are superior in obligation to those of the State. Religious freedom exists to protect the exercise of plausibly true understandings of God's actual commands, as against state power, and to disable state power to proscribe -- or prescribe -- religious exercise. The article explores four possible stances of society toward religious freedom, depending on whether society and state embrace the idea of religious truth …

Can We Please Stop Talking About Neutrality? Koppelman Between Scalia And Rawls, Chad Flanders

Pepperdine Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Mighty Work Of Making Nations Happy: A Response To James Davison Hunter, Patrick Mckinley Brennan

Pepperdine Law Review

This article is an invited response to James Davison Hunter’s much-discussed book To Change the World: The Irony, Tragedy, and Possibility of Christianity in the Late Modern World (Oxford University Press, 2010). Hunter, a sociologist at UVA and a believing Protestant, claims that law’s capacity to contribute to social change is “mostly illusory” and that Christians, therefore, should practice “faithful presence” in the public square rather than seek to influence law directly. My response is that it is, in fact, law’s stunning ability to alter and limit available choices that makes it an object of deservedly fierce contest. The wild …

And I Don’T Care What It Is: Religious Neutrality In American Law, Andrew Koppelman

Pepperdine Law Review

No abstract provided.

Faithful Presence And Theological Jurisprudence: A Response To James Davison Hunter , Zachary R. Calo

Pepperdine Law Review

This paper considers how James Hunter’s arguments, presented both in his address and his book To Change the World, might inform the development of a constructive religious legal theory based in the particular resources of Christian theology. In speaking of religious legal theory, I mean something quite different than a theory of law and religion. For some time, the academic conversation about law and religion has centered around issues concerning church-state relations and, more broadly, the place of religion within the liberal political order. Yet, the regnant methodological concerns that have shaped this discourse reflect the boundedness of law to …

Symposium Introduction: The Competing Claims Of Law And Religion: Who Should Influence Whom? , Robert F. Cochran Jr., Michael A. Helfand

Pepperdine Law Review

No abstract provided.

Law, Religion, And The Common Good, James Davison Hunter

Pepperdine Law Review

No abstract provided.

Just Another Brick In The Wall: The Establishment Clause As A Heckler's Veto, Richard F. Duncan

Nebraska College of Law: Faculty Publications

"When rights are incorporated against the States through the Fourteenth Amendment they should advance, not constrain, individual liberty."'

Although the First Amendment explicitly protects individuals against only laws made by "Congress," the Supreme Court has long held that, under the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, the states are forbidden from "depriving" persons of the fundamental individual liberties protected by the First Amendment.' Thus, under the so-called doctrine of incorporation, a particular provision of the First Amendment (as well as of the rest of the Bill of Rights) "is made applicable to the states [only] if the Justices are …

The Politics Of Religious Establishment: Recognition Of Muslim Marriages In South Africa, Peter G. Danchin

Faculty Scholarship

This paper explores the normative dissonances and antinomies generated by the politics around religious establishment by examining post-apartheid law reform efforts in South Africa to recognize Muslim marriages. Since the late 1990s, the South African Law Reform Commission has initiated various projects to recognize the claims of and redress past discrimination against different religious communities, including tribal groups living under customary law and religious minorities with their own family and personal status laws. It is striking how the norms and assumptions underpinning this debate differ from engagements involving the claims of religious communities in Europe and North America where broadly …

Brief For Prof. Leslie C. Griffin As Amica Curiae In Support Of Appellant, Kant V. Lexington Theological Seminary, Leslie C. Griffin

Supreme Court Briefs

No abstract provided.

Religious Freedom In The United States: ‘When You Come To A Fork In The Road, Take It', Charles J. Russo

Educational Leadership Faculty Publications

As expansive as the Supreme Court’s view of the First Amendment religion clauses has been, its jurisprudence has demonstrated that its rulings do not always achieve the outcomes desired by proponents of religious freedom.³ From the perspective of supporters of religious freedom, this realization lends credence to the preceding wry comment by Justice Scalia. This article details the Court’s inconsistent treatment of Christianity, and people of faith broadly, especially in educational settings. These inconsistent judicial outcomes run the risk of increasingly marginalizing matters of faith and conscience in the public square.⁴ As discussed in this article, disputes over …

Springtime For Freedom Of Religion Or Belief: Will Newly Democratic Arab States Guarantee International Human Rights Norms Or Perpetuate Their Violation?, Robert C. Blitt

Book Chapters

The Arab Spring has generated unprecedented and seismic political and social upheaval across the Arab world. The reasons for the outbreak of widespread and vociferous public protest are myriad, but generally understood as including long-simmering resentment of government corruption and repression, underwhelming economic development, chronic unemployment and poor respect for human rights, including the treatment of individuals and groups affiliated with political manifestations of Islam. Despite the initial drama surrounding the street rallies, two years on, the pace of change has grown fitful and uncertain.

The purpose of this chapter is to consider one narrow aspect of the Arab Spring. …

Chapter 834: Clearing A Roadblock In The Battle Over Same-Sex Marriage, Sean D. O’Dowd

McGeorge Law Review

No abstract provided.

Chapter 287: Religious Accommodation For Employees, David Vidal

McGeorge Law Review

No abstract provided.

Religion And New Constitutions: Recent Trends Of Harmony And Divergence, Jeremy Patrick

McGeorge Law Review

No abstract provided.

Justice Kennedy’S Jurisprudence On The First Amendment Religion Clauses, R. Randall Kelso

McGeorge Law Review

No abstract provided.

Shari'ah Law As National Security Threat?, Cyra Akila Choudhury

Faculty Publications

This Article examines the recently proposed anti-shari’ah laws of Tennessee, Oklahoma and Arizona. It begins by examining the laws and their justifications and analyzes the 10th Circuit decision in Awad v. Ziriax upholding the injunction against Oklahoma’s Save Our State amendment. It then carefully analyzes the cases that have been cited as examples of shari’ah-creep and reveals that they are actually routine examples of comity and conflicts of law rules applied properly by a properly functioning judiciary. If these laws are not national security measures, what is their true purpose? The Article posits that the new laws are the latest …

The Mighty Work Of Making Nations Happy: A Response To James Davison Hunter, Patrick Mckinley Brennan

Working Paper Series

This article is an invited response to James Davison Hunter’s much-discussed book To Change the World: The Irony, Tragedy, and Possibility of Christianity in the Late Modern World (Oxford University Press, 2010). Hunter, a sociologist at UVA and a believing Protestant, claims that law’s capacity to contribute to social change is “mostly illusory” and that Christians, therefore, should practice “faithful presence” in the public square rather than seek to influence law directly. My response is that it is, in fact, law’s stunning ability to alter and limit available choices that makes it an object of deservedly fierce contest. The wild …

Saving The Deific Decree Exception To The Insanity Defense In Illinois: How A Broad Interpretation Of Religious Command May Cure Establishment Clause Concerns, 46 J. Marshall L. Rev. 561 (2013), Bella Feinstein

UIC Law Review

No abstract provided.

When The Mesopotamian Honeymoon Ends: The Code Of Hammurabi’S Assumptions About The Roles Of Spouses And Problem-Solving Approach To Regulating Marriage, 46 J. Marshall L. Rev. 1005 (2013), Lars Nelson

UIC Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Unanimous Verdict According To The Talmud: Ancient Law Providing Insight Into Modern Legal Theory, Ephraim Glatt

Pace International Law Review Online Companion

Part I of this paper will provide background information regarding the current academic discussion surrounding the unanimous verdict. Part II will discuss the startling Talmudic passage on the unanimous verdict. It will additionally focus on one explanation that radically reinterprets this passage. Part IIIA will introduce two schools of thought on the rationale behind the anti-unanimity rule. Part IIIB will highlight two areas of modern legal theory affected by such rationales.

On "Unease" And "Idealism": Reflections On Pope Benedict Xvi's Educating Young People In Justice And Peace And Its Message For Law Teachers, Lucia A. Silecchia

Scholarly Articles

Pope Benedict XVI recently wrote about the challenges facing those who have the responsibility for the education of the next generation. His insights, expressed last year, were addressed not simply to a Catholic audience but to all who look to the future and see the obligation to train young people "in justice and peace" to be a noble vocation and one solution to some of the difficulties that face the modern world. Although it was not directed to, or intended primarily for, law professors, the document has much to say to those whose vocation lies in legal education. This essay …

Bankrupting The Faith, Pamela Foohey

Articles by Maurer Faculty

This Article presents the results of a comprehensive empirical study of religious organizations that filed bankruptcy under Chapter 11 from the beginning of 2006 to the end of 2011. It examines the institutions’ characteristics, reasons for filing, and case outcomes to investigate whether Chapter 11 is an effective solution to their financial problems. In investigating the religious organizations’ cases, the Article also assesses the role of bankruptcy courts in adjudicating Chapter 11 cases and places the cases within theories about the larger purposes of Chapter 11.

The study finds that the vast majority of debtors are small organizations that operate …

Faithful Presence And Theological Jurisprudence: A Response To James Davison Hunter, Zachary R. Calo

Scholarly Works

This paper considers how James Hunter’s arguments, presented both in his address and his book To Change the World, might inform the development of a constructive religious legal theory based in the particular resources of Christian theology. In speaking of religious legal theory, I mean something quite different than a theory of law and religion. For some time, the academic conversation about law and religion has centered around issues concerning church-state relations and, more broadly, the place of religion within the liberal political order. Yet, the regnant methodological concerns that have shaped this discourse reflect the boundedness of law to …

Religious Toleration And Claims Of Conscience, Kent Greenawalt

Faculty Scholarship

One aspect of the issue of toleration of religion is how far the government and others should recognize religious claims of conscience. Such claims will be present in any liberal democracy. The particular controversies on which attention is mainly focused shift, but certain underlying themes remain.

In this essay, I outline what I take to be the major issues about government recognition of religious claims of conscience. I then address the special problems created when a claim of conscience ends up competing with an opposing claim of conscience or with basic premises about fairness and justice. We can conceive of …

Religion And Theistic Faith: On Koppelman, Leiter, Secular Purpose, And Accomodations, Abner S. Greene

Faculty Scholarship

What makes religion distinctive, and how does answering that question help us answer questions regarding religious freedom in a liberal democracy? In their books on religion in the United States under our Constitution, Andrew Koppelman (DefendingAmerican Religious Neutrality) and Brian Leiter (Why Tolerate Religion?) offer sharply different answers to this set of questions. This review essay first explores why we might treat religion distinctively, suggesting that in our constitutional order, it makes sense to focus on theism (or any roughly similar analogue) as the hallmark of religious belief and practice. Neither Koppelman nor Leiter focuses on this, in part because …

Unwanted Exposure To Religious Expression By Government: Standing And The Establishment Clause, Carl H. Esbeck

Faculty Publications

For nearly half a century the Supreme Court has relaxed traditional standards of justiciability and permitted taxpayer standing when a claimant has invoked the Establishment Clause in a lawsuit to prohibit government funding of religion. The Court has recently cutback, however, permitting taxpayer standing only when a tax is extracted from the claimant and money is appropriated by a legislature to fund a statutory program that directs the use of public aid for religion.

The State Of Israel’S Constitution; A Comparison Of Civilized Nations, Mark Goldfeder

Scholarly Works

The art of constitution-making is never one-dimensional. In regard to the United States' model, it has recently been argued that "[d]espite the enormous literature on the critical period, including the foreign affairs imperatives behind the movement for reform, it is not fully understood that the animus behind the reform effort that culminated in the new Constitution was a desire to ensure that the United States would be in a position to meet its international commitments and thereby earn international recognition."' While there are obvious differences, and while this concept is perhaps of even greater importance and more poignantly felt for …

Law, Religion, And Culture Intertwined: A Case Study In The Development Of American Jewish Law, Mark Goldfeder

Scholarly Works

Law and religion share an underlying structure built on commandments and corresponding commitments. They also share a space in the formal regulation of a person's daily life. Oftentimes, they attempt to legislate in the same specific areas, and oftentimes they come to different final conclusions, or to similar conclusions, but for very different reasons. This article explores the concept of child support in Jewish and American law, respectively, noting how the standards that Jewish law courts impose are actually governed by the hybrid and sometimes competing claims of religious law, secular law, and contemporary cultural norms. In some times and …

Separation Of Church And State, Neutrality And Religious Freedom In American Constitutional Law, Robert A. Sedler

Law Faculty Research Publications

Religious freedom is a favored value under the United States Constitution. The Constitution provides two-fold protection to religious freedom by means of the Establishment Clause and the Free Exercise Clause. The Establishment Clause protects against the “establishment” of an official church by the government and against governmental action “establishing religion,” while the Free Exercise clause is a textual guarantee of peoples’ right to practice their religion and to hold and act on religious beliefs, free from governmental interference. The Establishment Clause would appear to an outside observer as strongly endorsing the concept of separation of church and state, and the …