prayer
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The Distinctly Awful Society
Unable to enforce existing laws, Quebec is contemplating curtailing religious freedom even more Continue reading
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Follow Instructions
School prayer is unconstitutional ― even in Alberta and Saskatchewan A couple of months ago, Benjamin Oliphant wrote, on the Policy Options blog, about a controversy over school prayer in Alberta: some schools still start their days with the Lord’s Prayer, which some parents oppose. Constitutionally, Mr. Oliphant pointed out, the matter is somewhat complicated. A Continue reading
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A Prayer for Neutrality
This morning, the Supreme Court delivered its judgment in the municipal prayer case, Mouvement laïque québécois v. Saguenay (City), 2015 SCC 16, holding that a prayer recited by the Mayor at the beginning of the city council’s meetings, as well the municipal regulation which regulated its recitation, infringed the City’s duty of neutrality and the rights Continue reading
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Thanksgiving
Over at the Volokh Conspiracy, Will Baude has posted the text of a proclamation issued by George Washington, then the President of the United States, in 1789, to call for national Thanksgiving celebrations, and an excerpt from a letter written by Thomas Jefferson in 1808, when he was President, to explain his refusal to issue a Continue reading
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What to Thump
This morning the Supreme Court heard the oral argument in Mouvement laïque québécois v. Saguenay (Ville de), a case on the validity, under the Québec Charter of Human Rights and Freedoms of a municipal by-law authorizing the mayor and those municipal councillors who wish it to publicly read a prayer just prior to the official Continue reading
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Cui Bono?
In a post published last week, Josh Blackman points to an important question that can help us think about the permissibility of public prayer ― not only prayer at municipal council meetings (the post’s immediate context), which the U.S. Supreme Court recently considered in Town of Greece v. Galloway (a case I briefly discussed here) and which Continue reading
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All Greek
On Monday, the Supreme Court of the United States delivered its judgment in the case of Town of Greece v. Galloway, finding constitutional the town’s practice of opening the monthly meetings of its board with a prayer read by a “chaplain of the month,” chosen from among the town’s religious congregations. I have blogged about Continue reading
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The Puzzle of Neutrality
While we are waiting for the conclusion of the greatest show on earth, a.k.a. as the Supreme Court’s hearings on the Senate reference, here are a couple of thoughts on an unrelated matter ― the case in which the Court has been asked to consider the validity under the Québec Charter of Human Rights and Continue reading
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Danai Preces Legentes
Although courts in different countries are not infrequently called upon to consider similar issues, it is not very often that they do so at the exact same time. But that might be the case this year with the question the constitutionality of municipal councils opening their meetings with prayers. In Canada, the dispute concerns the Continue reading
Double Aspect 