Reynolds v. United States

admin — Sun, 03 Sep 2023 10:45:00 +0000

This week’s religious freedom case is one near to my experience as a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (the “Church”). Reynolds v. United States, 98 U.S. 145 (1878), is a case in which the United States Supreme Court upheld a statute that restricted the free exercise of religion by Mr. Reynolds. At the time, some members of the Church were engaged in the practice of polygamy, and Mr. Reynolds was being tried criminally for so doing. The opinion of the Court glosses over many procedural and due process errors committed by the prosecution, any number of which would be fatal to a criminal prosecution today, in order to get to the finding that the Court wanted to make, to wit: that the federal government had the power to infringe on the religious practices of a persecuted and marginalized minority adhered to, simply due to the government’s dislike of that practice.

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Permoli v. New Orleans

admin — Sun, 27 Aug 2023 09:27:00 +0000

Today’s case, Permoli v. New Orleans, 44 U. S. 589 (1845), deals with a city ordinance which required all funerals to be performed at a specified “obituary chapel” rather than at individual houses of worship. The case text does not specifically identify why this restriction was imposed, nor does it identify who was entitled to benefit from such an undertaking. But, a certain Roman Catholic Priest, Bernard Permoli, officiated in funeral services for a Mr. Louis Le Roy (deceased) in the Roman Catholic Church of St. Augustin in New Orleans. The penalty for this infraction was a fine of $50.00, which Father Permoli refused to pay despite admitting that he had performed the funeral in question at his parish church rather than at the Obituary Chapel.

Father Premoli argued that this requirement impermissibly restricted the free exercise of his religion and of that of his parishioners. He prevailed at the trial court level, but the Louisiana State appellate court found this lacking. As a result he sought a ruling from the US Supreme Court.

His appeal did not help. The Supreme Court, as courts often do, took as their first step of the analysis to examine whether they had jurisdiction to address the question at issue. They decided that they did not. “The Constitution makes no provision for protecting the citizens of the respective states in their religious liberties; this is left to the state constitutions and laws.” Id. at 609. The First Amendment of the US Constitution simply did not apply to state governments and laws, and did not protect the citizens of Louisiana from state laws that might have otherwise been obstinate to the rights and privileges that the First Amendment sought to protect.

Of course, those of you with a view to the present state of things will recognize that this distinction no longer applies, and the 14^th Amendment extended Constitutional protections to everyone, but that is for a future post.

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Reynolds v. United States

Permoli v. New Orleans