usa, rights, legal, freedom, constitutionAs many US readers will know, the US constitution offers special protection for religious practise, but why is this really necessary?
That last sentence may have already set some fires burning, so let me qualify a little.
If I have the right to free speech, I want to tell my blog readers that God is great, what is that other than me excising that freedom ?
If I have the right to free assembly, why would gathering like minded individuals in a hall to chat nonsense (like a church for instance) not be protected by that right?
What are the benefits and drawbacks of specifically mentioning and protecting the right to practise religion?
Edit: Isn’t the fact that it is impossible to define what is a religion and what is a shared revelation problematic ?
For the US, at the time of the US Constitution’s authoring, religious discrimination was as big of a social issue as is sex, race, sexual orientation is now, so that is part of the reason why it was added. Also, reread the wording:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
What it is really saying there is that the State will have no part in religion, and vice-versa. The government will not establish nor endorse a religion, nor will it limit it’s citizens choice and practice of religion. These are important in a secular state.
Is there overlap? Sure. Has that protected religion? (or our right to lack it?) Entirely.
There are a lot of instances of repetition in law. You can make the case that what you believe is speech or assembly. But it really isn’t, is it?
So protection for one’s beliefs is important. And was especially so for the volumes of people who fled to the ‘new world’ to escape religious intolerance. (Mostly the nonacceptance of a particularly nutty religion, but also early secularists, of which many of the founding fathers were.)
Law is funny like that.
The main reason for the freedom of religion clause was to protect the people from the government.
Without it, governments could (try to) force religious beliefs on their people. This is obviously something that we would want to avoid. So, I would say, Yes, the freedom of religion clause is very important.
In other words, the purpose of freedom of religion was less to allow people to practice freely, and more to keep government from imposing religion on its people.
More info:
There are also historical reasons for the clause. Many settlers in America originally arrived to escape religious prosecution on the motherland. So, this became an important facet when founding the new country.
For a historical answer, look to the history of England’s war with itself and Europe over the Catholic/Protestant issue. The war of the Roses was tied to this issue, as early as 1455, and certainly through the civil war period. Persecution of puritans and calvinists persisted right up through the 1690s at least. (although it was officially renounced in 1689)
The puritans came to the US in part seeking religious freedom from the state religion of England and from the persecution they experienced there. Even established in America, there was religious persecution intra and inter colony. Quakerism was outlawed in virginia in the 1650s. William Penn lived to something like 1715, and even then there were problems about faith.
So it’s pretty easy to trace a strong current of religious concern in the colonies, whether it be puritanism, Catholicism, or whatever. The US constitution specifically guarantees this freedom so that the religious minorities spread across the various colonies wouldn’t fear the hand of a state religion like in England or France.
The inclusion of the Establishment Clause (as it is referred to in the US) in the First Amendment, was essential in the light of what was then very recent history: Discrimination at the hands of mandatory, “established” State religion in Britain.
The “Bill of Rights” (as the first 10 amendments to the US Constitution are known) were specifically enumerated to prevent a government from claiming these areas were in its pervue. I find it to be a refreshing and necessary rarity to have a document explicitly spell out (though, obviously subject to 235+ years of subsequent interpretation of what the explicit terms mean) what is off-limits to government.
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