Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

To: lugsoul
Spiff - tell us all about your theory. If the Utah Legislature decides to establish Mormonism as the state religion, and the SCOTUS says it is unconstitutional, why don't you explain to us all how the Utah Supreme Court can overrule the SCOTUS. That is exactly what you are saying.

When the Constitution was ratified there was at least one state with an official religion. The SCOTUS would be wrong if they said that a state could not have a state religion just as they were wrong when they said Dred Scot was only property and that the imagined right to privacy in the Constitution prevented states from enacting laws against murdering babies.

What part of "Congress shall make no law..." do you and your hypothetical SCOTUS not understand?

And why do you imagine that our nation's form of government is a judgeocracy or some crap like that and not a Constitutional Republic of several sovereign States? Where did you learn otherwise?

383 posted on 07/02/2003 7:28:34 AM PDT by Spiff (Liberalism is a mental illness - a precursor disease to terminal Socialism.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 277 | View Replies ]


To: Spiff
Do you want the establishment of a state religion? Sounds like you do. How about the establishment of a national religion? And what shall the people who aren't members of that religion do? Shall they be forced to convert? Shall they have to worship in secret? Shall other religions be banned?
384 posted on 07/02/2003 7:33:10 AM PDT by Catspaw
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 383 | View Replies ]

To: Spiff
"The SCOTUS would be wrong if they said that a state could not have a state religion" -

Well, the 14th Amendment prohibition on the state depriving any person of liberty, including 1st Amendment liberty derived from the language beginning "Congress shall make no law...", says your view is wrong. And so the SCOTUS has held for the better part of a century.

I hope you understand the implication of your argument. If "Congress shall make no law..." is the last word (despite later Amendments), then the state in which you reside can pass laws restricting free speech, freedom of the press and free exercise of religion - and there is no Constitutional problem at all with such laws.

That may be the country you want to live in, but it is not mine.

385 posted on 07/02/2003 7:40:17 AM PDT by lugsoul
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 383 | View Replies ]

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article


FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson