Significance: This case further defined the separation of church and state. In this case the Supreme Court determined that the posting of Bible verses in schools violated the establishment clause of the First Amendment.
Background: A 1978 Kentucky statute required classrooms in public schools to post copies of the Ten Commandments, purchased with private contributions, on their walls. Sydell Stone and other citizens challenged the statute, claiming that its clearly religious intent violated the establishment clause of the First Amendment. They brought their suit against James Graham, the superintendent of public instruction of Kentucky. The lower courts upheld the statute on the grounds that the statute had a secular, or nonreligious, purpose and did not advance or limit religion. Therefore, the lower courts judged, Kentucky was not violating separation of church and state.
Decision: This case was decided on November 17, 1980, by a vote of 5 to 4. The majority struck down the Kentucky law, and the opinion was issued per curiam, or by the whole court, rather than by a single justice. The Supreme Court used a three-pronged test devised in Lemon v. Kurtzman to decide whether (1) the statute had a secular legislative purpose, (2) its primary effect was neither to advance nor limit religion, and (3) it did not lead to excessive government entanglement with religion. The Court found that the statute failed the test because it had a clearly religious purpose, making it unconstitutional. Chief Justice Warren Burger and Justices William Rehnquist, Harry Blackmun, and Potter Stewart dissented.
Excerpt from the Opinion of the Court: “The pre-eminent [most important] purpose for posting the Ten Commandments on schoolroom walls is plainly religious in nature. The Ten Commandments are undeniably a sacred text in the Jewish and Christian faiths, and no legislative recitation of a supposed secular purpose can blind us to that fact. . . .
“This is not a case in which the Ten Commandments are integrated into the school curriculum, where the Bible may constitutionally be used in an appropriate study of history, civilization, ethics, comparative religion, or the like. Posting of religious texts on the wall serves no such educational function.”
