P.S.
Let's say the religious guys get a majority together to elect legislators pledged to enact a law secretly based on their religious convictions/beliefs...
The law is passed...
A minority (nonbelievers or other-believers) smells a rat. They challenge the law through the appellate system...
The justifications for the new law must be squared with the Constitution, ie, reasons must be given...
Unless the appellate process itself has been usurped and seized by judges desiring to legislate religious beliefs for their own sake, the unpacking of the proposed statute will reveal its particularist origin, and it will be dismissed, as has happened hundreds, or thousands, of times in American jurisprudence. I read in the paper recently about a judge in Tennessee who has insisted on displaying a giant replica of the Decalog in the courtroom because he believes God wants him to. The appellate courts have quite properly dismissed this argument. Even though the religious consensus in Tennessee supports what he's doing, in the end, he probably won't get away with it. The Supreme Court will not permit it.
But... such usurpation may be, I acknowledge, the shape of the future. It is certainly what is feared by all advocates of the firm separation of church and state.
If it does come, Christopher, you won't like it, and neither will Neocon, as it dawns on you the extent of what has become thinkable. It is already beginning to happen, with the "right to life" litmus test for judicial appointments. |
