Scorecard for _America's Godly Heritage_ video Claim 1: 'The Supreme Court ruled that Secu

Scorecard for _America's Godly Heritage_ video

Claim 1: "The Supreme Court ruled that Secular Humanism is a viable
First Amendment Religion.

Cases cited: Torcaso v. Watkins (367 U.S. 488), 1961, and an
unnamed 1985 decision.

Torcaso v. Watkins ruled nothing of the sort; a footnote mentioned
"Secular Humanism" as a "Among religions in this country which do
not teach what would generally be considered a belief in the existence
of God [sic]." This did not refer to what "secular humanism" generally
refers to today, but to a church in California, the Fellowship of
Humanity. The footnote cited Fellowship of Humanity v. County of
Alameda, 153 Cal. App. 2d 673, 315 P. 2d 394. I checked the second
cite, which is the _Pacific Reporter_, and found that the Fellowship
of Humanity formed in 1952 and was suing the County of Alameda to
recover property taxes and penalties paid under protest. The
California Appeals Court ruled that this was a legitimate religion
and therefore tax exempt (2-1 decision). (This case was filed
September 11, 1957.) The members of the Fellowship of Humanity
referred to themselves simply as "humanists," not as "secular
humanists."

I earlier suspected that the unnamed 1985 decision referred to Brevard
Hand's decision involving Arkansas' Act 590 creationism law, but that
case was resolved in 1982. I then suggested that maybe it was the
Louisiana creationism case, Edwards v. Aguillard. That appears to be
mistaken. (The Supreme Court ruled in favor of Aguillard, against
Louisiana Gov. Edwards, in 1986. I found the Circuit court decision,
which also went against Edwards. Perhaps Hand was involved at a lower
level, but I don't know.) So this is inconclusive--the video doesn't
say what the case is.

Claim 2: "The Supreme Court ruled that atheism is a religion."

Cases cited: Theriault v. Silber and Malnak v. Yogi.

The Supreme Court has never had anything to do with a case named
Malnak v. Yogi. There was a Malnik v. United States appealed to
the Supreme Court, but that was a tax case that apparently had
nothing to do with religion. (The Supreme Court did not hear
that case.)

Theriault v. Silber (453 FSupp 254) was also never heard by the
Supreme Court. It had to do with religion and the First Amendment,
but nothing to do with atheism. Harry Theriault, a/k/a Shilo, a/k/a
Bishop of Tellus, was a highly litigious federal prison inmate with
a reputation as an escape artist who started his own religion, the
"Church of the New Song," in an attempt to gain special privileges
and disrupt prison life. For example, he tried to claim that he
should be allowed to grow a beard because of his status as a bishop
(and the second Messiah). He tried to get appointed as the prison
chaplain for the Church of the New Song. Various aspects of the
"church" involved threats of violence and bloodshed. The U.S.
District Court ruled that this was not a genuine religion, and that
its activities were not protected by the First Amendment. (Theriault
had numerous other lawsuits, several of which were appealed all the
way up to the Supreme Court, which did not hear any of them.)

Score for this video (4 claimed Supreme Court cases):

1 of undetermined status,
1 undiscovered (but definitely not a Supreme Court case),
1 genuine Supreme Court case grossly misrepresented,
1 genuine case not heard by the Supreme Court grossly misrepresented.

I'd suggest that either dishonesty or incompetence is involved--probably
both.

Jim Lippard             Lippard@CCIT.ARIZONA.EDU
Dept. of Philosophy     Lippard@ARIZVMS.BITNET
University of Arizona
Tucson, AZ 85721