A Wall of Separation · Episode 4 of 14 · 41 min
How the First Amendment Came to Bind Every State: Cantwell and Everson
For 150 years the First Amendment restrained only Congress. Between 1940 and 1947 the Supreme Court bound the states to the religion clauses, with Cantwell incorporating free exercise and Everson incorporating non-establishment. Everson enshrined Jefferson's wall of separation while upholding bus fare reimbursement for parochial students, 5-4.
Who's who
- Hugo Black+2 more episodesJustice who wrote Everson and adopted the wall of separation
- Wiley RutledgeJustice who wrote the principal Everson dissent
- Owen RobertsJustice who wrote the unanimous Cantwell opinion
- Robert H. Jackson+1 more episodeJustice whose Everson dissent said the reasoning contradicted the result
- Arch EversonNew Jersey taxpayer who challenged bus fare reimbursement
- Thomas Jefferson+10 more episodesSource of the wall of separation phrase in his 1802 letter
- James Madison+6 more episodesAuthor of the Memorial and Remonstrance invoked by both sides
Where it happens
- New Haven, Connecticut+1 more episodeWhere Jehovah's Witnesses were arrested in the Cantwell case
- Ewing Township, New JerseySchool board whose bus reimbursement was challenged in Everson
Timeline
- 1833Barron v. Baltimore holds the Bill of Rights restrains only the federal government
- 1925Pierce v. Society of Sisters secures parents' right to choose private religious schooling
- 1930Cochran v. Louisiana upholds secular textbooks for parochial pupils under a child-benefit theory
- May 20, 1940Cantwell v. Connecticut incorporates the Free Exercise Clause, 9-0
- February 10, 1947Everson v. Board of Education incorporates non-establishment and upholds the bus subsidy, 5-4
Still debated
Critics argue the Establishment Clause originally protected state establishments, so incorporating it is conceptually odd. Others dispute whether Black read Jefferson's private letter correctly, and where the child-benefit theory stops is unresolved.
← PreviousWhen U.S. Public Schools Were Quietly Protestant — and Catholics Fought BackNext →How School Prayer Ended: Engel v. Vitale and Abington v. Schempp
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