Market-protecting chaplains and the First Amendment

[Sanford Levinson]

There is a fascinating story in today's NYTimes,
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/13/movies/13dhar.html?ref=arts&pagewanted
=print, about a documentary on an Alabama prison whose lifer inmates
engaged in a Buddhist meditation program.  It was a voluntary program,
so I assume there are no First Amendment problems (though I'd obviously
be very interested if anyone disagrees).  What is relevant to our group
is the following:
 
  

No one thought these guys could tolerate a 10-day meditation course,"
Ms. Phillips said in a phone interview. But the prisoners did more than
tolerate it.

"We were finding that after this 10-day course, inmates were better able
to control their anger and better able to conduct themselves," said Dr.
Ron Cavanaugh, director of treatment at the Alabama Department of
Corrections, who worked with Ms. Phillips to bring Vipassana meditation
to Donaldson. "The initial group had about a 20 percent reduction in
their disciplinary histories." After the course ended and the film crew
returned to Massachusetts, the Dhamma brothers continued meditating
daily, with a longer sitting once a week.

But months later, in July 2002, they received word that they would no
longer be allowed to sit, and Ms. Phillips would no longer be allowed to
film. 

"The chaplain had reservations about inmates turning into Buddhists and
losing his congregation," Dr. Cavanaugh said. "He called the
commissioner; the commissioner called the warden and told the warden to
shut down the program."

 

Is there any conceivable constitutional defense of the Corrections
system capitulating to the "reservations" of the chaplain, who seems
motivated by nothing else than a fear that he was about to lose some
market share.  (Would it be any better if he feared that the inmates
would lose their prospect for eternal salvation by forsaking
Christianity in favor of Buddhism?)  As it happens, after four years,
the Department changed its mind, and the documentary that is the focus
of the story thus has a "happy" ending.  And, query, would anyone have
standing to sue for damages (and what would they be?) for the
unconstitutional four-year hiatus caused by the unconstitutional
capitulation?

sandy

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