A marked increase in court cases affecting religious liberty and separation of Church and State during 1959 was noted by the American Jewish Congress today in the annual report of its Commission on Law and Social Action, During the year under review, the commission was involved in most of the litigation affecting Sunday-closing laws, religious practices in the public schools and religious tests for public office, the report stated.
This litigation resulted in several decisions favorable to “broad interpretation” of the constitutional guarantee of religious freedom and separation of Church and State, it was noted. Among them was a decision by a three-judge Federal court in Massachusetts barring the enforcement of the state Sunday-closing law against persons who observe a day other than Sunday as their religious day of rest.
Another decision described as a “significant court victory,” was handed down by a Federal district court in Pennsylvania, prohibiting the daily reading of the Bible in the state’s public schools. In another case in which the American Jewish Congress participated, the Missouri Supreme Court invalidated a zoning ordinance in a St. Louis suburb which barred the building of a synagogue in a residential area.
A number of successes were achieved through representations to administer bodies without resorting to the courts, the report stressed. These included: discontinuance of the practice of saying grace in a number of New Jersey public schools; and termination of sectarian baccalaureate services in a high school in Berkley, Mich.
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
