Abington School District v. Schempp

Appellant
School District of Abington Township, Pennsylvania
Appellee
Edward Lewis Schempp
Appellant's Claim
That a Pennsylvania law requiring daily Bible readings in public schools violates the First Amendment requirement of church-state separation.
Chief Lawyers for Appellant
John D. Killian III and Philip H. Ward III
Chief Lawyer for Appellee
Henry W. Sawyer III
Justices for the Court
Hugo Lafayette Black, William J. Brennan, Jr., Tom C. Clark (writing for theCourt), William O. Douglas, Arthur Goldberg, John Marshall Harlan II, Earl Warren, Byron R. White
Justices Dissenting
Potter Stewart
Place
Washington, D.C.
Date of Decision
17 June 1963
Decision
The Supreme Court struck down the Pennsylvania statute by a vote of 8-1.
Significance
For the second time in two years, the Court headed by Chief Justice Warren handed down a decision prohibiting religion in the public schools. This time, because of the hostile response to the first decision, the Court outlined a clear standard for evaluating legislation that might offend the First Amendment's Establishment Clause.
In 1962, the Supreme Court decided the case of Engel v. Vitale, striking down the recitation of a state-authorized prayer in public schools. Engel was greeted with public outrage and was denounced by congressmen and cardinals alike. When Representative Frank Becker sponsored a constitutional amendment to overturn the decision, a Gallup Poll revealed that 76 percent ofAmericans supported this proposal. Becker's was in fact just one of 150 suchamendments, all of which ultimately failed.
Schempp was, in a sense, a case meant to test the resolve of the justices and the public. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) sought out theSchempps and argued their case for them. They were a Unitarian family with school age children living in Pennsylvania. They objected to a state law requiring that a Bible passage be read each morning in the public schools. Their case was joined with that of Madalyn Murray and her son William, professed atheists and residents of Baltimore, Maryland. The Murrays likewise objected to astate-sponsored program of daily Bible readings in the public schools. In the first case, the parents won their trial; in the second, the school board was victorious. The Supreme Court agreed to review both decisions as a means ofclarifying any doubt that may have lingered in the wake of Engel.
Court Articulates a Test for Establishment Clause Questions
As in Engel v. Vitale, the vote was 8-1 against a state law authorizing public school sponsorship of activities resembling prayer. All but one of the justices clearly endorsed the First Amendment's opening passage: "Congressshall make no law respecting an establishment of religion . . . " All agreedthat the Fourteenth Amendment's Due Process Clause made this prohibition binding on the states. This time, however, the opinion of the Court was writtennot by the First Amendment absolutist Black, who had written for the Court inEngel, but by the more moderate Clark. The Bible readings at issue here were just as unconstitutional as the state-sponsored prayer being questioned in the earlier case; the fact that the state had actually composed the nondenominational prayer in Engel made no difference. Lest there be any confusion about what constituted acceptable legislation that touched on religion, Clark spelled out a test for constitutionality:

The test may be stated as follows: what are the purpose and the primary effect of the enactment? If either is the advancement or inhibition of religion then the enactment exceeds the scope of legislative power as circumscribed by the Constitution. That is to say that to withstand the strictures of the Establishment Clause there must be a secular legislative purpose and a primary effect that neither advances nor inhibits religion.

Clark could hardly have been clearer. If added reinforcement were needed to reassure the public that the Court was not opposed to religion, the Catholic Justice Brennan wrote a 74-page concurring opinion reviewing the history of the First Amendment and the means by which the founding fathers had arrived atthe Establishment Clause. And the Jewish Justice Goldberg wrote a second concurring endorsement of the opinion of the Court.
The lone dissenter, as in Engel, was Justice Stewart, who once again indicated that he found the Court's holding to be anti-religious. He felt theproper emphasis in deciding such cases should be on the First Amendment's Free Exercise Clause, which adds that "Congress shall make no law . . . prohibiting the free exercise [of religion]." Although the Schempp Court plainly thought they had put the issue of school prayer to rest, it raged on. TheAmerican public and politicians remained keenly interested in religion and the public school system. Proposals for a constitutional amendment permitting school prayer continued to surface. Toward the end of the twentieth century, the Supreme Court grew more conservative in orientation, and more justices began to share Stewart's view of religion in the public schools.
Related Cases

• Engel v. Vitale, 370 U.S. 421 (1962).

Reading the Bible in Public School
Even though the Supreme Court has struck down state-sponsored Bible readingsand clubs in public schools, these rulings have not ended the debate as to whether or not the Bible has a place in public schools. At issue is whether theBible should be used as a history textbook in schools. Opponents say that while the Bible may be an historical document, it is not an accurate portrayalof history. They argue that to use the Bible as a textbook gives a religiousview of history and thus an infringement of First Amendment religious liberties.
Sources
"Dispute Settled over School Bible Courses."Christian Century, 1 April1998.