The Free Exercise of Religion in America: Its Original Constitutional Meaning

ISBN-13: 9783030060510 / Angielski / Twarda / 2019 / 317 str.

Ellis M. West

Recenzje

"THE FREE EXERCISE OF RELIGION IN AMERICA: ITS ORIGINAL CONSTITUTIONAL MEANING is a tour de force. It will surely become the book from which future debate over the historical origins of the religion clauses, particularly the Free Exercise clause, begins. ... THE FREE EXERCISE OF RELIGION IN AMERICA lands in our scholarly midst at a time of continuing political and legal struggles over the meaning of religious liberty." (Andrew R. Murphy, Law and Politics Book Review, October, 2019)

Spis treści

Preface

Chapter 1: Introduction                                                                                                           

Chapter 2: Constitutional Rights and Ascertaining their Original Meaning                                   

Chapter 3: Setting the Stage                                                                                        

Chapter 4: The Meaning of Religious Liberty in Virginia                                                    

Chapter 5: The Meaning of Religious Liberty in the Other Southern States                                 

Chapter 6: The Meaning of Religious Liberty in the Middle States                                    

Chapter 7: The Meaning of Religious Liberty in the New England States                         

Chapter 8: Initial Conclusion                                                                                                   

Chapter 9: The Constitutional Meaning of Religious Freedom: Part One              

Chapter 10: The Constitutional Meaning of Religious Freedom: Part Two                       

Chapter 11: Final Conclusion                                                                                                  

Index                                                                                                              

O autorze

Ellis M. West is Emeritus Professor of Political Science at the University of Richmond, USA. His scholarship focuses on the religion clauses of the First Amendment, as they were originally understood and have been interpreted by the US Supreme Court.

Blurb

This book explains the original meaning of the two religion clauses of the First Amendment: “Congress shall make no law [1] respecting an establishment of religion or [2] prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” As the book shows, both clauses were intended to protect the free exercise of religion or religious freedom.  West shows the position taken by early Americans on four issues: (1) the general meaning of the “free exercise of religion,” including whether it is different from the meaning of “no establishment of religion”; (2) whether the free exercise of religion may be intentionally and directly limited, and if so, under what circumstances; (3) whether laws regulating temporal matters that also have a religious sanction violate the free exercise of religion; and (4) whether the free exercise of religion gives persons a right to be exempt from obeying valid civil laws that unintentionally and indirectly make it difficult or impossible to practice their religion in some way. A definitive work on the subject and a major contribution to the field of constitutional law and history, this volume is key to a better understanding of the ongoing constitutional adjudication based on the religion clauses of the First Amendment.