How can the Court possibly assert that the First Amendment mandates governmental neutrality between religion and nonreligion and that manifesting a purpose to favor adherence to religion generally is unconstitutional? Who says so? Surely not the words of the Constitution.

--U. S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia

The Constitution - by granting the government no authority over religion and thereby excluding it from the cognizance and jurisdiction of the government - mandates governmental neutrality with respect to religion, which includes neutrality between religion and nonreligion.

The Constitution doesn't say a lot of things. It doesn't say one word specifying that the Supreme Court is it's final arbiter, for example.

Does Scalia think we should overturn the Supreme Court's powers of Judicial Review?

ha....they find things in the constitution all the time.

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We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne'er so vile....

Not true. Article III Section I states that the Judicial Power shall be vested in One Supreme Court, and Justice Joseph Story in his seminal opinion in Martin v. Hunter's Lessee stated that in that particular clause "Judicial Power" means all the judicial power. Therefore the Supreme Court has jurisdiction over all things falling under the judicial umbrella, power exceeding that of any other court in the land. Hence, the final arbiter.

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"The only crime in America is not having any money."
-Berthold Brecht

"This interview...is not about me..."
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I can't see how anyone can honestly think that the Constitution is the ONLY law document of any worth. The US has hundreds of law codes and documents, all stemming from investiture and enabling statutes that allowed them. It'd be a pretty poor library if it only had one book.

Anyway, Drake is right, there's a lot unsaid in the the Const. For example, nobody's in charge of the Air Force.....

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"My opinions may have changed, but not the fact that I am right." - Ashleigh Brilliant(?)
(Voting for None Of The Above, so far...)

The exact language of the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution with regard to religion is this:

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;"

There are two basic parts to this. One, Congress cannot make any law that "respects" an establishment of religion. Two, Congress cannot make any law that prohibits the free exercise of religion. It is absolutely true that a person has the right to choose what faith they will be a member of or to choose no faith at all and it is absolutely true that Congress cannot establish a national church, but I think that many aspects of the first amendment are misconstrued by people today. A lot of people seem to believe that the first amendment prohibits government from having anything whatever to do with anything religious and interpret that government can't even mention the name of God or something like that. These people seem to think that the "wall of separation of church and state" (a phrase not actually found in the U.S. Constitution but comes from a letter from Thomas Jefferson to the Dunbury Baptists) is a 50 ft. reinforced wall with barbed wire and a huge chasm separating two enemies rather than a chain link fence that separates two friendly neighbors.

What the first amendment does is prohibit government from stopping people from worshiping and prevents government from playing favorites with particular religions. It does not mean that government cannot give support and reverence to religion in general. The word "respecting" is used in the same way as it is in the phrase "God is no respecter of persons". It means simply to not play favorites. An "establishment of religion" just simply means an established religion (Ex. Baptist, Muslim, Catholic, etc). Those who argue that things like "In God we trust" are violations of the first amendment are ultimately wrong because such does not favor or restrict any religious establishment.

Those who doubt me need to look to history. The same Congress that first sent the first amendment to the states for ratification saw no problem with having Congressional prayer at the beginning of each meeting of Congress (this is a practice that continues even today). George Washington saw no problem in issuing a general Thanksgiving proclamation that encouraged people to reverence God on Thanksgiving. Religious symbols can be found in many buildings that date back to the Founders times. Finally, the Declaration of Independence states that God is the Giver of man's rights:

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights,"

The first amendment prohibits a national church and prohibits government from forcing anyone to worship a certain way and prohibits government from not allowing people to believe as they so choose but it does not cause government to have nothing whatsoever to do with religion.

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Serious Quotes:


Funny But True Quotes
Those who argue for complete secularism are funny. They see what government does and then argue that we don't need it to start with prayer.

You failed to mention that the U. S. Constitution grants the government it established no power whatsoever over religion and that even if the First Amendment was abolished, there would still be a wall of separation between religion and the authority of the federal government and the 4th Amendment would still prohibit the state authorities from exercising any sort of jurisdiction over religion.

I didn't read the rest of your argument because it appears to be erected on sinking sand.

I will finish reading it when I have the time. It looks like you put some serious thought into it.

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I find it appalling that Justice Antonin Scala, in his dissenting opinion in McCreary County v. ACLU, constructed his model of "the relationship between church and state" in America without even considering the actual text of the Constitution. How do incompetents like him get on the U. S. Supreme Court?

Where did the lawmakers indicate that the Constitution means what Joe Story says it means?

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I find it appalling that Justice Antonin Scala, in his dissenting opinion in McCreary County v. ACLU, constructed his model of "the relationship between church and state" in America without even considering the actual text of the Constitution. How do incompetents like him get on the U. S. Supreme Court?

Where do they indicate that the Constution means what the Superme Court says it means as opposed to what Congress or the President say it means?

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"It's a good feeling to shoot a bad guy. Something you democrats would never understand. Americans are homesteaders, we want a safe home, keep the money we make, and shoot bad guys!"

----Denny Crane

Beats me, dude. They meant for us to use the common law rules of construction to ascertain the meaning of the Constitution.

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I find it appalling that Justice Antonin Scala, in his dissenting opinion in McCreary County v. ACLU, constructed his model of "the relationship between church and state" in America without even considering the actual text of the Constitution. How do incompetents like him get on the U. S. Supreme Court?

I think Justice Marshall said it best in Marbury v. Madison:

"It is emphatically the province and duty of the judicial department [the judicial branch] to say what the law is. Those who apply the rule to particular cases, must of necessity expound and interpret that rule. If two laws conflict with each other, the courts must decide on the operation of each. So if a law [e.g., a statute or treaty] be in opposition to the constitution: if both the law and the constitution apply to a particular case, so that the court must either decide that case conformably to the law, disregarding the constitution; or conformably to the constitution, disregarding the law: the court must determine which of these conflicting rules governs the case. This is of the very essence of judicial duty.
If then the courts are to regard the constitution; and the constitution is superior to any ordinary act of the legislature; the constitution, and not such ordinary act, must govern the case to which they both apply.
Those then who controvert the principle that the constitution is to be considered, in court, as a paramount law, are reduced to the necessity of maintaining that courts must close their eyes on the constitution, and see only the law [e.g., the statute or treaty]. This doctrine would subvert the very foundation of all written constitutions."

Marbury v. Madison, 5 U.S. 137, 177-78 (1803).

It appears to me that you're arguing the position Marshall addresses in the second bold face part of the quote.

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"The only crime in America is not having any money."
-Berthold Brecht

"This interview...is not about me..."
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What do you think they actually do then?

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"The only crime in America is not having any money."
-Berthold Brecht

"This interview...is not about me..."
-

Really? Please:

"Show us some evidence that the lawmakers believed that at the time they were framing and ratifying the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. "

Indicate "What did James Madison say, during the making of the Constitution, that might shed some light on the rules and principles that should be used to interpret the Constitution?"

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"It's a good feeling to shoot a bad guy. Something you democrats would never understand. Americans are homesteaders, we want a safe home, keep the money we make, and shoot bad guys!"

----Denny Crane

In the Constitution itself.

The Constitution is the "supreme law of the land." (Article VI) "The Judicial Power shall be vested in one Supreme Court..." (Art III Sec. I) "The Judicial Power shall extend to all Cases, in law and equity, arising under this Constitution." (Art. III Sec, II)

THe Constitution then confers Original Jurisdiction on the Court in a limited number of cases, while giving it "appellate jurisdiction, both as to law and to fact," for all other types of cases.

These parts of the Constitution are the source of the case deciding function Justice Marshall spoke of in Marbury v. Madison. Because of the fact that the Court is vested with the power of declaring acts of Congress unconstitutional, it implicitly has the power to decide what the law is, and what it means.

On the other hand, the Constitution is very clear as to what the legislative and Executive functions are. Absent a few specifics, Congress gets to make law and declare war. The President gets to carry out the executive power, which includes commanding the armed forces, nominating: 1) "officers of the united states," 2) federal court judges, and 3) the power to make treaties with foreign nations (all with advise and consent of Senate). Other than that the president has been conferred no power by the Constitution, and as such, has no power to interpret, or even make law. The only remotely legislative function the president carries out is the veto power. The other area where the extent of the legislative and executive powers blur is the function of the VP as president of the Senate, but even then the VP only intercedes when there is a deadlock in votes.

Other than that there really is no source in the Constitution for your proposition that either the Legislature or the President get to decide what laws mean, and how they should be interpreted.

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"The only crime in America is not having any money."
-Berthold Brecht

"This interview...is not about me..."
-

Well, first of all, when it comes to Constitution, the Supreme Court doesn't interpret the actual text of the Original Constitution and the Bill of Rights very much anymore. Most of the time, when a case involves the Constitution, the Court is interpreting previous Supreme Court Opinions.

Second, I don't think it really matters what rules of construction or other type of methodology the Court presently uses - on those occasions when it does actually revisit the actually words of the Constitution and attempt to ascertain the will of lawmakers in the late 178's and early 90's when the Constitution and the first ten amendments were adopted - if they don't use the common law rules of construction. Wrong is wrong. Right is when the common law rules of construction are used.

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I find it appalling that Justice Antonin Scala, in his dissenting opinion in McCreary County v. ACLU, constructed his model of "the relationship between church and state" in America without even considering the actual text of the Constitution. How do incompetents like him get on the U. S. Supreme Court?