West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette

Appellant
West Virginia State Board of Education
Appellee
Walter Barnette
Appellant's Claim
That a state law mandating a daily salute of the American flag by public school children does not violate the First Amendment's guarantee of religious freedom.
Chief Lawyer for Appellant
W. Holt Wooddell
Chief Lawyer for Appellee
Hayden C. Covington
Justices for the Court
Hugo Lafayette Black, William O. Douglas, Robert H. Jackson (writing for theCourt), Frank Murphy, Stanley Forman Reed, Owen Josephus Roberts
Justices Dissenting
Felix Frankfurter, Wiley Blount Rutledge, Harlan Fiske Stone
Place
Washington, D.C.
Date of Decision
14 June 1943
Decision
The Supreme Court struck down the West Virginia flag salute law.
Significance
The majority opinion in Barnette is one of the Court's greatest and most sweeping statements about the fundamental freedoms memorialized in the Bill of Rights.
The Jehovah's Witnesses have a long history of evoking the First Amendment tochallenge state laws. In 1940, they lost a major court battle in Minersville School District v. Gobitis, in which the Supreme Court voted 8-1 thata Jehovah's Witness child could be expelled from a public school in Minersville, Pennsylvania, for refusing to salute the American flag on religious grounds. This outcome had been thought to be a product of pre-war concerns aboutnational loyalty--especially in view of Justice Frankfurter's discussion in the majority opinion of how only the "felt necessities" of society can override the First Amendment's guarantee of freedom of religion.
Somewhat unexpectedly, Gobitis produced a backlash. Some members of society interpreted the decision to mean that the Jehovah's Witnesses were un-American, and attacks on them increased, particularly after the United Statesentered World War II in 1941. These actions in turn sparked a reaction, and critics of the Gobitis decision proliferated. Even the American Legionsupported a proposed law that would make saluting the flag a voluntary activity. Walter Barnette, a Jehovah's Witness, chose this moment to bring a suit challenging the West Virginia flag salute law, which had been modeled on the Court's opinion in Gobitis.
The U.S. District Court for the Southern District of West Virginia granted Barnette's request that the state school board be enjoined from enforcing the flag salute requirement. The school board then appealed this decision to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Supreme Court Holds That Compulsory Flag Ceremonies Violate ConstitutionalGuarantees of Free Speech
This time, by a vote of 6-3, the Supreme Court struck down a state flag salute law, overruling Gobitis in the process. But whereas the earlier decision had relied primarily on the First Amendment's Free Exercise of ReligionClause, the Barnette Court couched its decision in language evoking freedom of speech. The choice to salute the flag was speech, the Court said, and the First Amendment protected individuals from compelled speech. It almostdid not matter that the Jehovah's Witnesses had religious objections to pledging allegiance to the American flag; neither they, nor anyone, could be forced to verbally espouse beliefs they did not hold.
To underscore the interrelatedness of the fundamental freedoms memorialized in the first ten amendments to the Constitution, Justice Jackson, writing forthe Court, delivered an oratory to the Bill of Rights:

The very purpose of a Bill of Rights was to withdraw certain subjects from the vicissitudes of political controversy, to place them beyond the reach of majorities and officials and to establish them as legal principles to be applied by the courts. One's right to life, liberty, and property, to free speech, a free press, freedom of worship and assembly, and other fundamental rights may not be submitted to vote; they depend on the outcome of no elections.

After Barnette, the Court began to turn away from the belief-action doctrine altogether, creating religious exemption for believers of different stripes. In Sherbert v. Verner (1963), for example, the Court upheld a Seventh-Day Adventist's claim to unemployment benefits even though she declined to make herself available to work on Saturday (her Sabbath) as the law required. In Wisconsin v. Yoder (1972), the Court upheld the right of Amish parents not to send their children to public schools past the eighth grade.But when the Amish asked the government for an exemption from paying SocialSecurity taxes, the Court ruled against them in United States v. Lee (1982). Thereafter, Supreme Court decisions concerning the Free Exercise Clause steered away from constitutional exemptions for particular religious groups.
Related Cases

• Reynolds v. United States, 98 U.S. 145 (1879).
  
• Minersville School District v. Gobitis, 310 U.S. 586 (1940).
  
• Wisconsin v. Yoder, 406 U.S. 205 (1972).

The Flag Salute
Can schoolchildren be compelled to state the Pledge of Allegiance or salute the U.S. flag? Those who say yes believe that children do not have a constitutional right to refuse to do so. Advocates say that loyalty to the nation andthe government is important and that saluting the flag is one way to teach children to have loyalty for the country.
But those opposed to enforced flag salutes say that children should not haveto make a statement of loyalty if they do not wish. To make them do so, in turn, makes the action worthless. They also believe that children who are compelled to say the Pledge of Allegiance or salute the flag may one day resent the country that forced them to make these false statements or gestures.
Sources
Eastland, Terry. Religious Liberty in the Supreme Court. Washington, DC: Ethics and Public Policy Center, 1993.