Essay:School Prayer and the First Amendment
This essay is an original work by LeoS. Please comment only on the talk page.
Since 1962, ordinary Christian American taxpayers have been subsidising a public schooling system that, quite apart from its many failings and overwhelming liberal bias, insists on suppressing religion in the lives of young peoples. Liberals who support the destruction of classroom prayer insist that they are supporting the First Amendment right for people to hold different beliefs, and that the seperation of church and state prevents it.
Nothing could be further from the truth.
The seperation of church and state was designed to prevent the system whereby in England, senior bishops automatically gain seats in Parliament. It does not mean that the federal government should be attempting to secularize the nation. Indeed, attempting to do this would be a violation of the First Amendment which guarantees a freedom of belief. Liberals attempt to use this to claim that specifically Christian worship would be intolerant. In fact, even if the minority beliefs were disadvantaged (and exposure to Christianity will have anything but that effect), suppressing classroom prayer only disadvantages the majority Christian student population.
School prayer always stuck to the First Amendment. It allowed the majority Christian student group to use their freedom of belief and to create a feeling of mutual respect in the classroom. Nobody is forced to contribute against their beliefs; they can simply wait quietly and respect others' beliefs, in accordance with the First Amendment. Before the ban on school prayer, nobody was forced to act against their beliefs. Now, a majority of the students are forced to act against their beliefs.
This is not just a moral injustice, it is a constitutional one.
There has to be a reckoning.