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Home  News & Opinions Press Room BJC files ‘amicus’ brief opposing N.C. board’s prayer policy
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BJC files ‘amicus’ brief opposing N.C. board’s prayer policy |
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Baptist Joint Committee urges district court to uphold ruling in Forsyth County, N.C.
July 8, 2010
 WASHINGTON – A policy inviting religious leaders to use meetings of the Forsyth County (N.C.) Board of Commissioners as a platform to promote their faith is unconstitutional, threatens religious liberty and degrades religion by entangling it with government, says a Baptist church-state organization in a friend-of-the-court brief (pdf) filed Tuesday.
The Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty filed an amicus brief in the appeal of a case brought by two residents of Forsyth County, N.C., who filed suit in March 2007 against the county. The residents challenged the county’s practice of allowing sectarian government-sponsored prayers at county board of commissioners meetings under the First and Fourteenth amendments to the U.S. Constitution and sections of the North Carolina Constitution. They claimed the Board’s prayers advance Christianity and have the effect of affiliating the Board with it.
Click here to read the rest of the BJC statement. Click here to download a pdf version of the brief.
In its brief, the Baptist Joint Committee wrote that the legislative prayers delivered pursuant to the Board’s policy at the meetings are “clearly unconstitutional” under the U.S. Supreme Court’s 1983 ruling in Marsh v. Chambers. That ruling “carved out a narrow exception from general Establishment Clause principles for non-sectarian legislative prayer,” the brief states. The BJC urges the appeals court to uphold the district court opinion and to strictly apply Marsh in this case, only authorizing non-sectarian prayer rather than expanding Marsh “far beyond its limited holding” by allowing sectarian prayer.
“This narrow application of Marsh maintains the integrity of the Establishment Clause while recognizing the unique circumstances surrounding legislative prayer,” the brief states. A misapplication, on the other hand, would “further [blur] the line between church and state in an area of Establishment Clause jurisprudence where the threat of entanglement is already considerable.”
In a previous ruling on cross motions for summary judgment, a district court ruled the Board’s invocation policy violated the Establishment Clause. The court adopted the recommendations of a magistrate judge which reviewed the policy as implemented and stated that “these prayers as a whole cannot be considered non-sectarian or civil prayer.” It ruled that “the prayers given under Defendant’s policy do not reflect th[e] [religious] diversity” the policy purports to promote and instead had the effect of affiliating the government with Christianity.
The brief states that sectarian prayer, such as practiced under the Forsyth County Board of Commissioners written policy, violates the Establishment Clause by entangling the state with religion and conveying a message of religious endorsement.
The BJC wrote that “[i]n the legislative prayer context, the State has no place attempting to create a religious bazaar where every faith has a booth, a scenario far more likely to foster competition between sects than knit the cohesive ‘fabric of our society,’ the goal of the Supreme Court’s decision in Marsh,” the brief argues. “When the religious marketplace is made part and parcel of a legislative proceeding, courts entangle themselves in monitoring and regulating the competition.”
K. Hollyn Hollman, general counsel for the Baptist Joint Committee, said protecting both Religion Clauses of the First Amendment — no establishment and free exercise — is the way to protect religious liberty for everyone.
“The Supreme Court has upheld legislative prayer, but that should not be misconstrued to allow someone to exploit the prayer opportunity in a way that advances a particular religion,” Hollman said. “We all should pray for our government officials, but we should not ask the government to supply a platform to promote religion in a business meeting.”
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The Baptist Joint Committee is a 74-year-old, Washington, D.C.-based religious liberty organization that works to defend and extend God-given religious liberty for all, bringing a uniquely Baptist witness to the principle that religion must be freely exercised, neither advanced nor inhibited by government.
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