The Becker Amendment: A Constitutional Trojan Horse

Abstract

On June 25, 1962, in Engel v. VitaleJ the Supreme Court of the United States declared the New York Regents' Prayer to be in violation of the establishment clause of the First Amend ment to the Constitution of the United States. That date was immediately designated Monday, implying that the Court, in arbitrary fashion, had thrown to the winds the nation's hard won and greatly treasured religious freedom. Sober re flection and study shows that what was originally regarded as a decision against religious freedom was in reality a decision for religious freedom. The Regents' Prayer—Almighty God, we acknowledge our dependence upon Thee, and we beg Thy blessings upon us, our parents, our teachers and our country—was commissioned, adopted and promulgated for use in the public schools of New York by that state's highest educational authority, the State Board of Regents. Challenged by five families of varying re ligious faiths—Ethical Culture, Jewish, Unitarian—and of no religious faith, Engel v. Vitale went into the Reports of the United States Supreme Court thereafter to denote an excellent, if unconstitutional, example of government religion.2 The Supreme Court divided six to one in Engel v. Vitale. Justice Hugo Black, speaking for the Court, first demolished the argument that, although religious in nature, the Regents' Prayer was based on the spiritual heritage of the nation and was, therefore, without constitutional defect. By reviewing the history of the church-state relationship in England and the American colonies, Black demonstrated that the nation's spiri tual heritage, additionally if not primarily, demands separation of church and state for the benefit of both. The defenses of non denominational and non-compulsory were also unavailing. The