looming issues/cases in religious liberty

[Pybas, Kevin M]

Eugene,

 

Thanks for your reply to my question-a question that otherwise seems to
have landed with a thud.  

 

Kevin

 

________________________________

From: religionlaw-bounces at lists.ucla.edu
[mailto:religionlaw-bounces at lists.ucla.edu] On Behalf Of Volokh, Eugene
Sent: Thursday, January 11, 2007 11:27 AM
To: Law & Religion issues for Law Academics
Subject: looming issues/cases in religious liberty

 

    Whoops, hit enter too quickly; let me also add that I think such
preference for the parent who is willing to take the child to church
more often, or expose the child to more religion, violates both the
Establishment Clause and the Free Speech Clause.  For the most extreme
example, consider the 2000 Mississippi Supreme Court decision ordering a
mother to take her child to church each week, reasoning that "it is
certainly to the best interests of [the child] to receive regular and
systematic spiritual training"; but even if the judge issues no order
but just gives custody to the more churchgoing parent, the
constitutional issue remains.

 

    Eugene

 

________________________________

From: Volokh, Eugene 
Sent: Thursday, January 11, 2007 9:26 AM
To: 'Law & Religion issues for Law Academics'
Subject: RE: looming issues/cases in religious liberty

    It's been around for decades, and happens again several times a
year, but almost entirely under the radar -- judges giving preference in
child custody cases to more religious (or more practicing) parents over
less religious (or less practicing) parents, on the grounds that
religious upbringing is in the best interests of the child.  I'm not
speaking of cases where the child wants the religious upbringing
himself, or there's been long-standing religious training that it would
be disruptive for the child to stop; the cases simply consider a
parent's willingness to provide a more religious upbringing to be a
factor in favor of the parent.  The First Amendment issues, as best I
can tell, are almost never raised.  The longest line of such cases is in
Michigan, but there's also a long line in Mississippi, substantial
numbers in Arkansas, Louisiana, Pennsylvania, and South Carolina, and a
few in other states.  I discuss them at
http://www.law.ucla.edu/volokh/custody.pdf (which also discusses other
First Amendment / child custody questions); the Appendix, PDF pages
92-98 collects over 70 such cases from 1970 to the present, over 25 of
which are since 2000.  I just ran across another such case in Michigan,
where they are routine.

	 

	
________________________________


	From: religionlaw-bounces at lists.ucla.edu
[mailto:religionlaw-bounces at lists.ucla.edu] On Behalf Of Pybas, Kevin M
	Sent: Thursday, January 11, 2007 8:02 AM
	To: religionlaw at lists.ucla.edu
	Subject: looming issues/cases in religious liberty

	List members:  If I may, I would like to enlist the expertise on
this list to help me identify new issues in religious liberty that you
believe are on the horizon, or perhaps are already the subject of
litigation.  I don't mean the re-fighting of issues like school prayer,
or whether a particular display on public property is sufficiently
secular in character.  Though if you are aware of an issue or case that
has the potential to lead to the overturning of what seems to be
established precedent, or to expand or narrow precedent, I'm interested
in that too.  (No need to mention the Hein case currently before the
Supreme Court.)

	 

	Thanks.

	 

	Kevin Pybas

	Missouri State University       

	 

	 

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://lists.ucla.edu/pipermail/religionlaw/attachments/20070112/a331b5bb/attachment.htm