Isabella Garcia-salas
P#2
Wallace v. Jaffree
Facts
An Alabama law in 1978 authorized that teachers in public schools could take a minute of “silent mediation “ in the beginning of every school day. In 1981 it became a minute of “silent meditation or voluntary prayer”. Jeffree was a parent of three kids attending public school in Mobile County. His youngest kid was in kindergarten and got bullied by his peers because he refused to say the prayers. That’s when Jeffree decided to sue the school for violating the establishment clause of the first amendment because it exposed the kids to religious indoctrination.
Lower court verdict
It first passed through the U.S. District court. The court sided with the Alabama law and did not feel the law was unconstitutional. After the court of appeals found the law unconstitutional. Then it reached the Supreme Court and they founded unconstitutional.
Petition before the Supreme Court …show more content…
The plaintiff wanted to know whether a law that authorizes a period of silence in public schools for "meditation or voluntary prayer" is a violation of the Establishment Clauses?
What the Plaintiff really wants is “To suggest that a moment-of-silence statute that includes the word 'prayer' unconstitutionally endorses religion, while one that simply provides for a moment of silence does not, manifests not neutrality but hostility toward religion."
The argument of the
P#2
Wallace v. Jaffree
Facts
An Alabama law in 1978 authorized that teachers in public schools could take a minute of “silent mediation “ in the beginning of every school day. In 1981 it became a minute of “silent meditation or voluntary prayer”. Jeffree was a parent of three kids attending public school in Mobile County. His youngest kid was in kindergarten and got bullied by his peers because he refused to say the prayers. That’s when Jeffree decided to sue the school for violating the establishment clause of the first amendment because it exposed the kids to religious indoctrination.
Lower court verdict
It first passed through the U.S. District court. The court sided with the Alabama law and did not feel the law was unconstitutional. After the court of appeals found the law unconstitutional. Then it reached the Supreme Court and they founded unconstitutional.
Petition before the Supreme Court …show more content…
The plaintiff wanted to know whether a law that authorizes a period of silence in public schools for "meditation or voluntary prayer" is a violation of the Establishment Clauses?
What the Plaintiff really wants is “To suggest that a moment-of-silence statute that includes the word 'prayer' unconstitutionally endorses religion, while one that simply provides for a moment of silence does not, manifests not neutrality but hostility toward religion."
The argument of the