FREDERICKSBURG (ABP) — Sandra Day O'Connor has had her say again on an important church-state decision, in this case saying a Virginia city council's practice of offering non-sectarian prayers does not violate the United States Constitution.
The retired U.S. Supreme Court justice, sitting by special appointment on the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, wrote a July 23 decision for a unanimous three-judge panel. The judges upheld the city's policy against invoking the name of Christ while delivering prayers at council meetings.
In the case, Turner v. City Council of Fredericksburg, the judges said they did not violate the rights of one of its own members, Hashmel Turner, a part-time Baptist minister, who claimed in 2005 that the policy violated two parts of the First Amendment. He said it ran afoul of the establishment clause, which bans government endorsement or advancement of religion, and the free-exercise clause, which bans government from impeding the religious practice of an individual or group.
O'Connor and her colleagues disagreed with Turner.
“The council's decision to provide only non-sectarian legislative prayers places it squarely within the range of conduct permitted by” U.S. Supreme Court precedent on legislative prayer, O'Connor wrote. “The restriction that prayers be non-sectarian in nature is designed to make the prayers accessible to people who come from a variety of backgrounds, not to exclude or disparage a particular faith. The council's decision to open its legislative meetings with non-denominational prayers does not violate the establishment clause.”
On the free-exercise argument, O'Connor said, “Turner was not forced to offer a prayer that violated his deeply held religious beliefs. Instead, he was given the chance to pray on behalf of the government.”
Although he was unwilling to do so on the terms that his colleagues had set forth, O'Connor wrote, Turner “remains free to pray on his own behalf, in non-governmental endeavors, in the manner dictated by his conscience.”
The dispute began when Turner was elected to the council in 2002. Council members had, for years, taken turns opening meetings with an invocation of their choice. When his turn came around, Turner began offering prayers that invoked the name of Jesus Christ. After complaints from some residents and the threat of a lawsuit from the American Civil Liberties Union, the council adopted the non-sectarian prayer policy in 2005.
When Turner's name came up again in the prayer rotation after the new policy was passed, the council chairman asked him if he planned to offer his prayer in Christ's name. When Turner said he did, the chairman called on another council member to offer a prayer instead.
Attorneys for a Charlottesville-based conservative group, the Rutherford Institute, took up Turner's cause. They argued that the city discriminated against orthodox Christianity by allowing prayers in the name of “God” but not “Jesus Christ.”
Turner said O'Connor's ruling was off-base, according to the Fredericksburg Free Lance-Star. “She didn't feel my rights were being violated, but my rights are definitely being violated,” he told the newspaper. “It removed an opportunity for me to pray in the manner of my conviction and my belief.”
Attorneys for Turner have said they would appeal the case to the Supreme Court.