Journal: Bibliotheca Sacra
Volume: BSAC 152:607 (Jul 1995)
Article: Periodical Reviews
Author: Anonymous

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BSac 152:607 (Jul 95) p. 355

Periodical Reviews

“1993 Survey of Trends and Developments on Religious Liberty in the Courts,” Carl H. Esbeck, Journal of Law and Religion 10 (1993–94): 543-72.

Although this article appears in a journal focusing on the narrow field of religion and law within the larger and technical field of legal studies, the article touches on matters of interest to nonspecialists. The cases Esbeck cites deal with issues directly affecting the lives of people with strongly held religious beliefs and disbeliefs. In fact the descriptions of the court cases and the rationale for decisions reveal the diversity of ways in which the law and religious beliefs intersect.

Esbeck omits reviews of widely reported United States Supreme Court opinions and focuses on “interesting cases that may otherwise escape broad attention.” He organizes his reviews into 14 areas: labor practices and discrimination claims, taxes and tax regulation, public schools and equal access, private schools and universities, home schooling, tort claims, intrachurch disputes, religious symbols, free speech and political activities, government regulation of religion, government benefits and exemptions for religion, prisoner rights, clergy-parishioner privilege, and justiciability/abstention.

These reviews point out that courts have ruled on whether the Boy Scouts of America are obligated to receive self-professed atheists into their membership (they are not) and the reason (BSA is a private club with selective membership founded to advance a belief in God). Occasionally dissenting opinions are also given (other groups such as Little League or the Jaycees could exclude African Americans, Jews, Catholics, or others for similar reasons).

Other cases involve such questions as these: Can the Veterans Administration refuse to hire a woman as a Roman Catholic chaplain who has ecclesiastical endorsement, but is not an ordained priest? Can a restaurant owner be fined for not delivering a pizza to an abortion clinic? Can sharing one’s faith in the workplace be interpreted as harassment? Do ministers retain their tax exemptions when they work as administrators in Christian schools? Can an eighth-grade student distribute flyers for church events at her public junior high school? Do compulsory school laws require parents to be certified as teachers to home-school their high school children? Can New York City refuse to

BSac 152:607 (Jul 95) p. 356

grant the Ancient Order of Hibernians a permit for its annual Saint Patrick’s Day Parade unless it allows the Irish Lesbian and Gay Organization to march under its own banner? Should the City of Baltimore criminalize the intentional mislabeling of kosher foods? Can an atheistic, repeat, alcoh...

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