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The Constitution of the US Guarantees Absolute Religious Rights!

Stevicus

Veteran Member
Staff member
Premium Member
I don't think the Constitution guarantees unlimited religious rights.
 

Sunstone

De Diablo Del Fora
Premium Member
I think if I murdered someone the judge would take a dim view of my claiming I should get off free for the murder on the grounds it was exercising my right to murder someone for religious reasons. So, in that sense at least, I do not have absolute religious rights.

On the other hand, about a dozen or more times each year some one or another new guy or gal shows up on the Forum to tell me they have an absolute right to break every RF rule in the book in order to convert people to their religion, and that I'm a very very mean jerk to not to immediately appreciate their authority in the matter.

Why they always need to call me a jerk on top of telling me I'm wrong never ceases to amuse me. It's as predictable as bad morning breath the day following a meal of garlic. Not that they are wrong about me being a jerk, mind you. Just that they are predictable.
 

Ponder This

Well-Known Member
The Constitution prevents the government from: forcing people to follow a religion or prohibiting them from practicing a religion or prohibiting people from peaceably assembling.
 

Wandering Monk

Well-Known Member
The Constitution prevents the government from: forcing people to follow a religion or prohibiting them from practicing a religion or prohibiting people from peaceably assembling.

Then prohibiting polygamy is unconstitutional. That will get many fundamentlists undies in a twist.
 

beenherebeforeagain

Rogue Animist
Premium Member
The US Constitution (In Amendment 1) prohibits the federal government (and ONLY the federal government) from making any law concerning an establishment of religion, or the free exercise thereof. It means that neither Congress, nor the President or his administration, can make any law or order to establish or disestablish religion or religious bodies. However, the courts, including the US Supreme Court, have ruled that there are narrow conditions under which the federal government can take actions concerning churches and religions.

The Constitution also prohibits the imposition of any religious test for elected or appointed (and by extension, hired) officials.

The states, however, may under their Constitutions do more things concerning religion and churches, etc. True, most have also adopted very similar protections as the First Amendment, although because states inherently have the power to regulate individuals for reasons of public health and safety, and even for morals, they CAN do more things to regulate religious organizations and activities, especially for reasons of public health and safety.

Indeed, every constitutional guarantee, whether at state or national level, can have limits imposed where one right overlaps with another...therefore there are legal constraints on freedom of religion, press, assembly, and so on...and a resulting constant fight for balance between individuals, states, federal government, and the various organizations that people form.

This is one reason why the IRS reviews the finances of many churches and religious organizations (including hospitals and health care systems) and frequently finds cases where a nonprofit religious organization violated the legal requirements to be tax exempt.
 

Father Heathen

Veteran Member
Well of course there are limits like what if some cult wants human sacrifice?

In what way are you suggesting the Mormons are limited in their religious observance?

Of course, when it comes to rights and freedoms, the line should be drawn where they begin to encroach upon the rights and freedoms of others.
Your example of human sacrifice of course presents a victim, as being murdered is an obvious violation of a right/freedom.
However, assuming that this whole thread is hinting at polygamy, and assuming that those involved in such an arrangement would be consenting and informed adults, where's the victim that warrants the restriction?

Of course, forced marriages would be criminal, as they clearly violate the rights and freedoms of those being manipulated/coerced.
 

epronovost

Well-Known Member
However, assuming that this whole thread is hinting at polygamy, and assuming that those involved in such an arrangement would be consenting and informed adults, where's the victim that warrants the restriction?

It technically would be a breach of men and women equality since women aren't allowed to take many husbands. Though allowing a women to have many husbands would be a solution.

PS: having a lot of boyfriends or girlfriends at the same time isn't illegal.
 

Father Heathen

Veteran Member
It technically would be a breach of men and women equality since women aren't allowed to take many husbands. Though allowing a women to have many husbands would be a solution.

PS: having a lot of boyfriends or girlfriends at the same time isn't illegal.

If such a law was ever implemented, it would have to allow for any gender/sex combination. Whether or not specific religions have particular restrictions or limitations would be irrelevant.
 

Evangelicalhumanist

"Truth" isn't a thing...
Premium Member
I think that shouldn't be against the law for consenting adults. But ... I'm against the weird arranged marriages they have been known for doing. Don't force teenage girls to marry someone.
What do you suppose, in any community, the results of polygamy might be? That is, assuming that males and females are born in approximately equal numbers?

Would it not be that many males would be "involuntarily celibate," there being no females left over for them when some men have married many?
 

Brickjectivity

Turned to Stone. Now I stretch daily.
Staff member
Premium Member
The 1st Amendment guarantees US citizens the right to peacefully assemble? No, but it bars Congress from making it illegal to assemble. Its a bit of a grey area to me, since I'm not a lawyer. I don't know what happens if my state outlaws peaceful assembly or if my governor restricts assembly.

Technically speaking any law by US Congress or actions by its officers which prohibit people from assembling peacefully -- is illegal. I don't know if this trickles down to when a state governor declares martial law or not. I think its one of those things where its a matter of common sense.

Go tell that to the Mormons.
As far as I am told by actual LDS people do not seek to practice polygamy as the previous generations. They also do not call themselves Mormons, suggesting to me a change of denomination or perhaps policy.
 

Wandering Monk

Well-Known Member
The 1st Amendment guarantees US citizens the right to peacefully assemble? No, but it bars Congress from making it illegal to assemble. Its a bit of a grey area to me, since I'm not a lawyer. I don't know what happens if my state outlaws peaceful assembly or if my governor restricts assembly.

Technically speaking any law by US Congress or actions by its officers which prohibit people from assembling peacefully -- is illegal. I don't know if this trickles down to when a state governor declares martial law or not. I think its one of those things where its a matter of common sense.


As far as I am told by actual LDS people do not seek to practice polygamy as the previous generations. They also do not call themselves Mormons, suggesting to me a change of denomination or perhaps policy.

No, SCOTUS has upheld state and federal quarantine authority.

With regard to quarantine, SCOTUS upheld the authority of the state and federal governments to impose quarantines. This is from the Harvard Law site:

"The Supreme Court passed upon the validity of federal quarantine powers under the Commerce Clause and the simultaneous power held by states to implement their own quarantines in Bartlett v. Lockwood in 1896. The Court held as unquestionable the "authority of Congress to establish quarantine regulations and to protect the country as respects its commerce from contagious and infectious diseases,"[126] . It also, however, recognized that this federal power did not invalidate state laws relating to the same policy domain, citing Congress's decision "in view of the different requirements of different climates and localities and of the difficulty of framing general law upon the subject, ...to permit the several States to regulate the matter of protecting the public health as to themselves seemed best."[127] The Court thus seemed to view the federal appropriation of a power which had traditionally belonged to the states as justified under the Commerce Clause. Another case before the court in 1896 presented the more pointed question of whether state or federal laws would prevail in the case of conflict, when the federal law was enacted under the authority of the Commerce Clause and the state law enacted for the purpose of regulating health. In Hennington v. Georgia , Justice Harlan delivered the opinion of the court:

"If the inspection, quarantine, or health laws of a State, passed under its reserved power to provide for the health, comfort, safety of its people, come into conflict with an act of Congress, passed under its power to regulate interstate and foreign commerce, such local regulations, to the extent of the conflict, must give way in order that the supreme law of the land—an act of Congress passed in pursuance of the Constitution—may have unobstructed operation."[128]

This ruling left little question that Congress could enact quarantine laws and the Surgeon General could enforce them even if those laws conflicted with state quarantine laws."​
 
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