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United States Supreme Court
The case of Engel v. Vitale is rivaled only by Roe v. Wade for the impact
it has had on Americans or the response it has generated. This case also rivals Brown v. The
Board of Education of Topeka for the impact on how communities educate and socialize their students.
Conservatives assert that with this case, the "court outlaws God," and they attempt to trace
the demise of United States civilization from 1962. The ruling is still resisted in some parts of the
country. Because the Supreme Court did not outlaw personal, private payers at schools, or deny the right
to allow silent meditation, a long string of school prayer and silence cases followed Engel, as
states and communities tried to discover how to breach the wall of separation between church and state.
This case originated when the New York Board of Regents composed a nondenominational prayer, a prayer
intended to promote moral and spiritual training in the public schools. The principals in the New Hyde
Park school district were ordered to make all students recite this prayer at the beginning of the class
day. Teachers were forbidden to comment on the prayer, and students could be excused from the room if
they objected to the prayer. The rule and prayer were challenged as a violation of the First and Fourteenth
Amendments. As you can see in the following excerpt, Justice Hugo Black relied heavily on historical records
and James Madison’s notes to write the decision. The court said that this prayer was composed by government
officials for the sole purpose of fostering religious beliefs, and that made it a state-sponsored activity
inconsistent with the establishment clause. The court also pointed out that even if children were not
required to attend, they were stigmatized by leaving the classroom, and the pressure to conform made this
de facto coercion. Is the Supreme Court demonstrating a "hostility towards prayer and religion"?
How does Justice Black answer that assertion in the decision? On what basis is the court’s decision made?
What is the response of Justice Stewart in his dissent? Whom do you agree with more, and why?
Since anyone may still pray privately in school, former Sen. Jack Danforth (R.-Mo.) has pointed out that
God is obviously not outlawed in schools. To Sen. Danforth, who is an ordained minister, and many other
Americans, religion is a very personal rather than a political issue. Does this mean that prayer in the
school is still a genuine constitutional issue, or one being used and distorted for political purposes?
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