by Jeremy Leaming
The Roberts Court, some commentators have noted, appears to side more often than not with corporate interests, and has altered precedent on pleading standards that make it much easier for judges to dismiss civil complaints – think Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly and Ashcroft v. Iqbal. The Supreme Court also has weakened the ability of people to band together to challenge malfeasance of large corporations, see Wal-Mart v. Dukes and AT&T v. Concepcion.
A new ACS Issue Brief explores another avenue to the courthouse that the Roberts Court is narrowing, involving the ability of people to challenge unconstitutional government support of religion.
The First Amend
ment’s establishment clause requires that government act with neutrality toward religion, meaning a certain amount of separation between government and religion is a must. But, according to the ACS Issue Brief, the ability of people to bring constitutional challenges to government action supporting or advancing religion is becoming increasingly difficult.
In “The Slow, Tragic Demise of Standing In Establishment Clause Challenges,” Willamette University law school professor Steven K. Green writes, “By deciding not to decide certain classes of challenges, courts will effectively be throwing Establishment Clause questions … to the politically elected branches. Political expediency, rather than constitutional fealty, will become the rule of law, and Justice Robert Jackson’s immortal statement about withdrawing questions of constitutional rights from ‘the vicissitudes of political controversy’ and placing them ‘beyond the reach of majorities and officials’ will be stood on its head.”
Green notes that in its 1968 Flast v. Cohen opinion, the Supreme Court upheld the right of taxpayers to challenge “government expenditures where the litigant could demonstrate a connection between the legislative action authorizing the expenditure and the purported constitutional violation. As a result of Flast, any taxpayer could allege that a legislative appropriation on behalf of religion violated the Establishment Clause, regardless of her own connection to the entity or institution receiving the government funds.”
se where a group of taxpayers are challenging an Arizona tax-credit program that primarily benefits religious schools. The taxpayers allege that the program violates the separation of church and state.