we'll hear argument first this morning in case twelve six ninety six the town of greece versus galloway stronger thank you mr chief justice and may please the court the court of appeal's correctly held that the legislative prayers at issue in this case were not offensive in the way identified as problematic in march but the court then committed legal error by in drafting the indorsements asked on to march as a new barrier to the practice of legislative prayer mr hunger i'm wondering what you would think of the following suppose that as we began this session of the court the chief justice had called a minister up to the front court room facing the lawyers maybe the parties maybe the spectators and the minister had asked everyone to stand and to bellow their heads in prayer and the minister said the following he said we acknowledge the saving sacrifice of jesus christ on the cross we trust strength from his resurrection blessid are you who has raised up the lord jesus you who will raise us in our turn and put a spy his side the members of the court who stood responded amen made the sign of the cross and the chief justice then called your case would that be permissible i don't think so your honor and obviously this case doesn't present that question because what we have here is a case of legislative prayer in the marsh doctrine which recognizes that the history of this country from its very foundations and founding recognize the propriety of legislative  except it's not in a court room instead it's in a congressional hearing room maybe it's a confirmation hearing maybe it's an investigatory hearing of some kind and that a person is sitting at a table in front of the members of the committee ready to testify ready to give his testimony in support of his nomination and minister says the exact same thing i think that's a that's a closer question because of that congressional history but of course it's as far as i'm aware that it is the history of the applies to the legislative body as a whole not the committees but it would be a different question one obviously important distinguishing factor there in addition to the fact that it's not the legislative body as a whole we case than marsh because in march there was a paid chaplain from the same denomination for six hundred eleven years the prayer sounded almost exclusively like the ones that i read and one year on people in this community knew and were familiar with and what most of the ministers were most of the prayer sounded like this well no i mean it's clearly not correct that most of the prayer sounded like the one you just somehow what they call coercive because there are public hearings that are held that the public hearings are held at least thirty minutes after the prayer of anyone coming for the purpose of the public hearing can easily show up after the prayer if they don't want it why was that the fuse so promptly answered justice question to the effect that this would be a violation what why would there be a violation in the instance she put i'm sorry which instance of the first question justice kagan actually the hypothetical about the prayer in this court you seemed readily to agree that that would be a first amendment violation one well perhaps i conceded too much but i think the important distinction is between that both the judicial context and the legislative context on the one hand and the absence of a comparable history which is that same thought is that simply history that makes there's no rational explanation is just a historical aberration no it's not it's not a question of historical what's the justification for the distance the question of what the establishment clause is understood both at the time and throughout history to forbid and not to forbid the judiciary is different than a legislature legislatures can be partisan and the judiciary should not be that's correct your honor and clearly that's ok yes why you don't have another and if perhaps i misunderstood the hypothetical if the hypothetical is as you described with a different minister with it with an open process and nondiscriminatory process like the one we have here i think it would be a much closer case than this one but it might be constitutional but whether that case is constitutional or not this case is far from the constitutional line further from the constitutional line than the state legislature's practice in marsh because the chaplain from one denomination for sixteen years and yet that was constitutionally permissible in his prayers were not distinguishable in content from the prayers at issue here during the time that was relevant to the case wouldn't make any chalices if instead of as i understand the hypothetical there told to rise were invited to rise or in fact we were told stacy did something like that so there would be no indication of who was participating in the prayer center is that a ground of distinction that you're willing to accept or not i don't think that is constitutionally significant unless i mean it might be different people are compelled to stand but whether they are or not that i mean in the marsh case itself senator chambers testified that the practice in the nebraska legislature was for people stand and he felt coerced to stand because when he was there he tried to avoid it but when he was there he felt he needed to stand because everybody else was doing it he needed to have dealings with these people as a fellow legislator the court on the last held that he's an adult and he is expected to be able to disagree with things that he disagrees with and that is not a constitutional violation i wonder how far you can carry the your historical argument and whether some of these things are properly regarded as more historical artifacts right i mean our our motto is in god we trust right that's the motto it's been that for a long time right but it's true wouldn't we look at it differently if there were suddenly if there were a proposal today for the first time to say let's adopt a motto in god we trust would be you that the same way simply because it's in other words the history doesn't make it clear that a particular practice is ok going on in the future it means well this is what they've done they have done so we're not going to go back and revisit it just like we're not going to go back and take the cross out of every city seal that's been there since you know one thousand nine hundred but it doesn't mean that it would be ok to adopt a seal today that would have a cross in it does not necessarily but i think history is clearly important to the establishment clause analysis under this court's precedents in two significant respects both of which apply here one of which might not apply in your state with respect to your hypothetical the first being that history shows us that the practice of legislative prayer just like the motto has not in fact lead to an establishment and therefore we can be confident it is not a danger in danger of doing so and secondly the history of legislative prayer unlike your hypothetical goes back to the very framing of the first amendment the fact that and this is what the court said in march the fact that at the very time the first congress was writing and sending the first amendment out to the states to be ratified they adopted the practice of having a congressional chaplain and the congressional chaplains the record the historical record is clear if prayers that were existed in the past it was constitution was it constitutional in the parish if it was constitutional in the past why me why would it be on constitutional if the same thing is done today even without any past parallel practice it's only when i'm not it's past parallel practice essential i think this court's precedents have also indicated at least in some cases that if  practice is constitutional as we know it to be the case because of the fact that it has been understood to be constitutional and consistent with our religion clauses from the founding father prout practices that have no greater impact no greater we had a series of cases what is a utility rate breaking making board would come to the supreme court we say well it's enough like a legislative that is like march i don't think the public would understand that  honor whatever whatever line might be drawn between non legislative bodies and legislative bodies what we're talking about here is a legislative meeting of a legislative body and it would be it would be in congress as this court said in march if congress principles that undergird the establishment clause are equally consistent with the position we're advancing here as the as your opinion in the county of allegheny case indicates the fundamental the core of establishment clause concerned is  or conduct that is so extreme that it leads to the establishment of a religion because it is putting the government squarely behind one faith to the exclusion of others and that's clearly not what we're not with maggie about the individual plaintiffs here and what do we know about them they obviously have an appearance at proceedings and they object to the proceedings does the record show that they had matters before the town council during the hearings part of the  evidence of that there's no there response have no standing to assert the interests of children or police officers or award recipients or or or permit applicants they don't even claim to be in any of those categories and what about the public forum part they did speak occasionally that yes you're right we know what they spoke about well on least one occasion one of them spoke about the prayer or one or two occasions and then on multiple occasions spoke about a cable access channel issue and what did they what was the issue there something about that she was expressing vehement disagreement with the town's decision to award a cable access channel to one entity as opposed to another do you have any objection to to doing one thing that was suggested in the circuit court opinion which is to publicize rather thoroughly and in the area those who are not christians  perhaps not even religious are also welcome to appear and to have either a prayer or the equivalent if they're not religious you have an objection to that certainly not there really then then there is their disagreement on that point because certainly that was one of the concerns it was not anyone's website there are it's greece is a small town very near rochester and there at least in rochester lots of people of different religions including quite a few have no religion so could you work that out do you think if that were the only objecting going i don't know what the town's position would be on that but it certainly there would be no constitutional problem with doing that i mean here as a practical matter since no no i'm not saying it's a constitutional problem i got from the opinion of doing the opposite of not making an effort to make people who are not christian feel although they live in or near the town or are affected there by participants your own every time it's a perfectly rational approach when when any legislative body is going to have a practice of legislative prayer to go to the houses of worship in the community and saying it's not i want to know if you have any of you're making a good faith effort to try to include authors would you object to doing it i don't know what the town's position is on that i said as a practical matter that has already happened here the  town deputy supervisor was quoted in the newspaper saying anyone can come in for i guess that if you were different from what you get on a website that's different from making an organized effort to see that people get the word as i say i don't know what is the equivalent of prayer for somebody who is not religious i would somebody who is not religious in the room and in what is the equivalent of prayer it would be something but in in vocation of guidance and wisdom from from iraq i don't know yes thank you counsel mr chief justice please the court the second circuit's decision here requires courts to determine when a legislature has permitted too many sectarian references in its prayers or has invited too many christian prayer givers that approach is flawed for two reasons first it cannot be squared with our nation's long history of opening legislative sessions not only with a prayer but a prayer given in the preggers own religious idiom and second it invites exactly the sort of parsing of prayer that you have to do some arson so your honor you have to look at the car at the prayer for it to determine proselytizing but it's a very stiff rant series of judgments we submit than determining whether something is sectarian the kinds of debates are having i think are reflected in the difference is now seriously counsellor you can't argue that the quote that justice kagan read is not sectarian it invokes jesus christ as the savior of the world there are many religions who don't believe  that let's get past that so you're also sectarian we agree that these are sectarian but the kinds of debates that you're seeing among the parties whether for example fifteen percent fifty percent sixty percent of the congressional prayers are sectarian those are debates about whether holy spirit is sectarian cora district so the title is outside of x instead of prayer if the chief justice got up at the beginning of this session and said all rise for prayer would you sitting in a small rooms where hearings of this nature are being held when the guy who so baltz the chairman of this legislative body is about to rule on an application your bringing to him or her why do you think any of those people feel cold us to still so your honor i'd like to address the coercion point this way with respect to town councils it's our view that is a general matter that the municipal legislatures can invoke the same tradition of solomon izing and invoking divine guidance as federal and state legislatures we recognize there are differences that whatever and your honor has pointed to one and that's the what was called the public forum here and we think it's very because those are the ones where the is adjudicated license applications liquor applications and we do think it is important on this record that those are separated in time court of appeals appendix nine twenty nine and eleven twenty so that the per the meeting starts at six which is in the prayer when the prayer is but the word meetings to adjudicate those types of issues are at six thirty or six thirty two and so the type of concern that your is if we think there are three pillars in march first of all that the history is what the court looks to first and here there is a long history of legislative prayer second that the court should be very wary of parsing prayer to make sectarian judgements and third what marcia said is that adults are less susceptible to religious doctrine indoctrination and peer pressure mr woodward could you respond to this here's what our country promises our constitution promises it's that however we worship we're all equal and full citizens and i think we can all agree on that and that means that when we approach the government when we petition the government we do so not as a christian not as a jew not as a muslim not as a nonbeliever only as an american and what troubles me about this case is that here a citizen is going to a local community board supposed to be the closest the most responsive institution of government that exists and is immediately being asked  being forced to identify whether she believes in the things that most of the people in the room believe and whether she belongs to the same religious theme as most of the people in the room do and it strikes me that that might be inconsistent with this understanding that when we relate to our government we all do so as americans and not as jews and not as christians and not as nonbelievers justice kagan i think we agree with much of what you say but but w the difference here is that this approaching of the government body occurs against the backdrop of two hundred forty years of history which makes this different from the very beginning of our legislature from the first continental congress and then from the from the first congress there have been legislative prayers given in the religious idiom of either the official chaplain or a guest chaplain that have regularly invoked the the deity and the the language of the  just that it would be good or are you saying it would be necessary given the hybrid nature of this body so your honor with respect to some of the things we identify which are similar to the ones that justice pryor recommended i think our view is they're more akin to safe harbors but there are undoubtedly advancement challenges that could be brought and to the extent the town can point to things such as such as  public criteria and things like that that is helpful with respect to the public forum aspect i don't think we have a position as to whether it is required but we do think that that makes this case a much easier case because of that separation of the one part that is the strongest argument for the other side that there is an element of coercion that your application is is being ruled on that the separation the town has adopted makes that much less persuasive we think the other elements that the respond it's a point of two for coercion are ones that trouble us because there are things that have analogs in our history so for example they point to the presence of children but of course on the senate floor or the senate pages who are all high school juniors and should have done at your test is whether or not it is part of your taxes whether or not and advances religion if you ask a chaplain for the state assembly in sacramento california who's going to go to the same way to deliver a prayer are you going to  you want to adopt and i mean it is whether or not it is in fact honest and candid and fair to ask the minister or the or the priest or the chaplain or the rabbi if by appearing there's justice in may please the court petitioners answer to justice kagan so opening question is entirely formalistic there is no separation in time between the public hearing and the implication people appear before this town board to ask for personal and specific things our clients put shows on the cable channel they were concerned the cable channel was about to be abolished or made much with fusible people appear to ask for a times another part of the proceeding that is the hearing yes and that's when somebody has a specific proposal they want to something specifically before the board and they want relief they to variance the hearing is a particular kind of time that is that is somewhat separated in time the forum is not in people make quite personal proposals there they ask for board action they often get board action that is a legislative body at that point it's clearly a legislative body and not only the differences it's a town right and then the congress or state legislature where you have more formalized procedures this is this is a more direct democracy when a citizen appears and says solve the traffic problem at my corner so all of this nuisance family that commits a lot of crimes in my block that's not asking for legislation or a policy making that's asking for administrative action this board has legislate would be acceptable to christians jews muslims buddhists hindus to me an example of a prayer  week we take march to home to imply that atheists cannot get full relief in this context in a creed or center said that explicitly so points on which believers are known to disagree is is a set that's in the american context the american civil religion the judeo christian wonder tim example then i think the point about atheists is a good point but exclude them for present purposes and give me an example of a prayer that is acceptable to all of the groups that i mentioned but a third of the prayers in this record your honor are acceptable to me an example and i have the pressure the almighty praise to the creator to the almighty yes so if if a particular religion believes in more than one god that's acceptable to them well some of the religion so believe in more than one god believe that all their many gods are manifestations of the one god but the but the true polytheist i think were also excluded from the mccurry descent to all religions heavenly father is very broadly acceptable and the test cannot be unanimity because that's impossible right that's that's why the atheists are that's why the atheists are excluded i'm sorry just could you repeat your question well i'll repeat mine place who are supposed to make these determinations as they're supposed to be an officer of the town council that would view the prince have to be reviewed for his approval in advance no principal of the clergy make make this determination there's a two hundred year tradition of this kind of civic prayer the clergy know how to do it and if the city has a policy that an occasional violation when courage is not the city's responsibility so so this is left principally to the clergy by simply giving them instructions that they receive no instruction of any kind about the purpose of this prayer so there is an official in the town council that is to instruct g about what kind of prayer they can say that's right thirty seven state legislative bodies the house of representatives have these kinds of guidelines they issue them to the guest clergy before they appear  and if i'm if i'm that official and i think of prayer with over the top for being proselytizing in a particular sectarian i say i'd rather not you not come back next week and look for somebody else where you might have a conversation with him first and  second in other words but every man does now editing the content of editing the content of government sponsored prayers course these clergy can pray anywhere they want on their own time with their own audience but this is an official government event and people who are about to stand up and ask for things from the board and if there is co if coercion is the test of the free exercise clause why do we need a free exercise clause if there is coercion i'm sorry of the establishment clause why do we need to establish because if there's coercion i assume that would violate the free exercise clause when well i think i think that's right and that's why so it seems to me very unlikely that the test for the establishment clause identical to the test for the free exercise clause it seems to me unlikely as well coercion is one test for the establishment clause but there's also broad agreement on the quarter there has been that sectarian endorsements are prohibited by the establishment clause here varying degrees of importance citizens are asked to participate to join in the prayer they're often asked visit asked to participate and but not in any tangible way they say well i'm not going to participate and everybody's just sitting there  bet it is it is impossible not to participate without attracting attention to yourself and moments later you stand up to ask for a group home for your down syndrome child or for continued use of the public access channel or whatever your petition is  having just so far as you can tell irritated the people that you were trying to persuade and let me give you an example of a practice that's a little bit different maybe you'll say it's a lot different from what the town of greece does first of all this town starts out by making by proceeding in a more systematic and comprehensive way in recruiting chaplains for a month or whatever it is so instead of just looking into all the houses of worship within the town  places of worship but they may be outside the town boundaries that people within the town and who have here to a minority religion may attend and it makes it clear that it's open to chaplains of any religious of any religion on on a rotating basis and then they have a structure they are proceeding so that you have the crown and then the legislative part of the town meeting and then there's a clear separation in  time and access between valid part of the proceeding and the hearing where variances and things of that nature are held now you would still say that some constitutional because you have to add on that a prayer that successful to everybody is that it is there any other problem with what i've just outlined well if the separation in time really works that's part of the remedy that we've suggested is is possible here we still believe the prayer should be nonsectarian  yourself before the district judge and proposed its changes you think would be necessary to bring this back to within the constitutional town has to have a policy but just to be clear that cleared up are you talking about what would be satisfactory to the second circuit or satisfactory to you because you don't accept the second circuit's approach well we've tried to sort out their totality of the circumstances to make it what i'm talking about what would be and you say existing situation violates the constitution so what changes say stay away from point some which but weavers are known to disagree and we think the town should do what it can to ameliorate coersion it should tell the clergy don't ask people to physically participate that's the most important thing the government just disclaimers might help we think that's right the governments are just separating the prayer a bit more in time some states put the prayer before the call the order of the prayer could even be five minutes before the beginning the meaning the coercion can't be entirely eliminated but the gratuitous coercion the things that that are done that don't have to be done in order to have a prayer could be eliminated and we think those two pieces are the components of a remedy and still a clock and it seems to me that what would your missing here is and this is what distinguishes legislative prayer from other kinds the people who are on the town board or the representatives who are in congress or citizens they are there as citizens the judges here are not we're not here as citizens and as citizens they bring they bring to their job all of all of the predispositions that citizens have and these people perhaps invoke the deity at meals they should not be able to invoke it before they undertake a  serious governmental task such as an acting laws or ordinances there is a serious religious interest on the other side of this thing that people who have religious beliefs ought to be able to invoke the deity when they are acting as citizens and not not as as judges or as experts in the in the executive branch and it seems to that when they do that so long as all groups are allowed to be in there seems to me it seems to me an imposition upon them to to stifle the manner in which they they invoke their deity for heaven said they can go to d d or have a prayer and they can certainly pray any way they want silently or just before the meeting we said they cannot impose sectarian prayer on the citizenry and that is very different from what congress does is very different from what this court does maybe the course is analogy is legislative committee hearings where citizens interact we don't have a tradition of prayer there what  would what the town board is doing here is very different from anything in the tradition that they appeal to you know what are you i would like you to take into account an aspect of this i mean in my own opinion i don't know of anyone else's  talking for all of this but one of the a major purpose of the religion clauses is to allow people in this country of different religion concluding those of no religion to live harmoniously together now given that basic purpose what do we do about the problem of prayer in these kinds of legislative sessions one possibility you say you just can't do it secular but that is not our tradition that's correct or right the second possibility is the one that you are advocating and it has much to recommend it try to keep the net denominational try to make it as inoffensive to the others as possible that's the upside the downside is seeing supervised by a judge dozens of groups and today there are sixty or seventy groups of different religions coming in and saying no that doesn't work for us this doesn't work for us and that's the nightmare that they're afraid i mean even in this and that is say well you can't have them if there's any aspect of coercion that we just saw people walking into this room god save the united states and you want to win your case i didn't see people sitting down right then the fourth approach which is the that makes its appearance here is to say let's try to be inclusive now was enough in other words so you didn't get the right prayer today but you and even with the non religious you the many believe in the better angels of our nature in the spiritual side of humankind it's not impossible to peel them so you say you'll have your chance and that's the thing i would like you to explore i mean is there a way of doing that or is that preferable to the other ways or do we get into trouble we think that rotation does not work first of all because for several reasons but most citizens come for a single issue to one or two meetings they get the prayer they get that night they don't benefit from there were patients came in the rotation scheme will be dominated by the local majority maybe even disproportionate to its numbers religious minorities unfamiliar minorities give the prayer there often political protests or often threats and hate mail they don't want to give the prayer and many city councils won't stand up to the political pressure and enable those people to get to give the prayer so there are multiple reasons why rotation does not solve the problem here we think nonsectarian has some has a very long tradition government is not a competent judge of religious truth medicine said that was not a controversial proposition in the founding and even in the first congress in the prayers they point to there were no prayers there that violate our principle invoking details in which will be disagree because then ninety eight and a half percent of the population was protestant christ was not yet a point of fact and leaders actually agree that gets exactly to the problem with your argument about nonsectarian prayer yes when at the beginning of the country the kind of the population was ninety eight percent plus protestant and it became predominantly christian then it became predominant almost exclusively christian and jewish and as but now it's not that it's it's it's gone much further than that so we have a very religiously diverse country there are a lot of muslims out there a lot of hindus there buddhists there are all sorts of other and here install sorts of other religions and they all should be treated equally and that but i don't i just don't see how it is possible to compose anything that you could call a prayer that is acceptable to all of these groups you haven't given me an example we could not treat you not a pastor we could not treat everybody literally everybody equally without eliminating prayer altogether we can treat the great majority of the people equally with i'm not sure many others are you know we have always hypotheticals but the fact is we've done this kind of prayer in this country for two hundred years there's a long tradition of civic prayer and the clergy know how to do it but in greece no one has told them that's what we want you to do and i would say the one time the country in a major way got involved in government sponsored sectarian prayers that people disagreed about it was when we impose twice research the question of whether adults might be subject to similar pressures we may not the fact that children may be subject to subtle coercion in the way that adults are not right in some ways that adults are not but there's there's no doubt that before you stand up to ask for relief from a governing body you don't want to offend that body adults are subject to coercion here and in no competent attorney would tell his client doesn't matter what you visibly dissent from the prayer  not try to have your client make a good impression i'm just want to make sure what your but the your position is that town councils like grace can have prayers if they are non they're here in the papers and so forth are those satisfactory to you we'd like to be a little more explicit but those are besley better than if those are satisfactory to you then i wonder are they satisfactory to everyone and  will find all kinds of different beliefs and thoughts in this country and there will be people who say but i cannot give such a prayer if i am a priest in that particular a minister or whatever in that particular religion i must refer to the got to god as i know that god by name and what do we do with them that's what we can we can recommend it became we say that the constitution of the united states requires you know there are such people and i respect that and they should not be giving government prayers that they're taking on a government function when they agree to give the invocation for the town board mr like that's that's that's really part of the issue whether they're undertaking a government function or w acting as citizens in a legislative body representative of the people who bring who bring to that there their own personal beliefs i think the average person who who  congregation they are there invited by the board the program are selected by the board the board decides they have the prayer the board gives as one person and only one person time on the agenda to pray this is clearly governmental are held in santa fe we had an atheist the join that line assuming you accept that what would be the test that you would proffer taking out your preferred announcement that this prayer has to be said nonsectarian well the test that we have proffered is the tesla mccurry dissent points in which believers are known to disagree so you don't have to be a theologian points on which people are commonly know to disagree in the fourth circuit has had no difficulty in ministering this rule the cases that come to it are clearly sectarian consuming the nay that enforcing that standard and the standard i suggested involves the state very heavily in the  you had the problem mentioned by justice scalia that we're misrepresenting who we really are if if you really believe government can't throw lines here then your alternatives are either prohibit the prayer entirely or permit absolutely which refers repeatedly to jesus christ which is language that is accepted and admired and is incredibly important to the majority members of a community but is not accepted  army whether that language will be allowed in a public town session like this one that's really the question isn't it that's the issue that actually rises in the guts to please you that actually rises here is what i don't think that this is an easy question i think it's hard because of this i think it's hard because the court lays down these rules and everybody thinks that the court is being hostile to religion and people get unhappy and angry and agitated in various kinds of ways this goes back to what justice breyer suggested that part of what we're trying to do here is to maintain a multi religious society in a peaceful and harmonious way and every time the court gets involved in things like this it seems to make the problem worse rather than better but do you think well i don't i don't think that's true and that i mean there are people who distort your decisions or people who misunderstand your decisions  y and and innocently but keeping government neutral as between religions has not been a controversial proposition in this court and i don't think the fourth circuit has made it worse they've got a workable rule and  the prayers are no longer explicitly christian prayers in the fourth circuit and you know and they've been able to mostly enforce that and there hasn't been litigation at the margins because all the purser clearly  did this you had combined your two approaches that the town has to eat cannot you must make a good faith effort to to appeal to other religions who are in that area and then you had these words from the house the chaplain should keep in mind that the house of representatives where you would say whatever relevant group is comprised of members of many different faith traditions period end of matter is that sufficient those two things that would help him and we think some of the c government very heavily in religion well government became very heavily involved in religion when we decided there could be prayers to open legislative sessions marsh's the source of government involvement in religion and now the question is how to manage the problems that are rice well not the source of the government involvement in religion in this respect the first congress is the source for a fair not the tradition to which march points first congress and also adopted the first amendment that correct and that had prayers that did not address predestination or having to accept jesus as your savior or any other point where i was and you have known to disagree many of them were very explicitly christian were very explicitly christian but that was not a point of disagreement at the time they stayed away from the from any issue that protestants to secure their way it sounds quite a loose to say well now we can do this in washington and sacramento and austin test this but you people up there in grief can do that well it's not that the people in greece can't do it it this board is functioning in a fundamentally different way from what congress or the state legislature functions and i also mean my understanding is that the first chaplain in the senate was the episcopal bishop of new york is in bacharach and he used to read he governing the church they have not offered a single example of a prayer in the founding year that addressed points on which protestants were known to disagree and i don't think there is one of the founding generation kept government out of religious disagreements and what has changed is not the principle there's changes that we have a wider range of religious disagreements today no further questions we ask you to for thank you mr laycock mr hunger you have three minutes remaining thank you mr chief justice first i'd like to correct the one factual misimpression to the assertion that only non christian prayer givers delivered the prayer after through two thousand and eight it's not in the record but that the official website of the town agrees shows that at least for non christian caregivers delivered prayers there after in two thousand and nine ten eleven and thirteen on the sectarian points clearly the and on the sectarian line just like the point the court does the senate brief the amakosa preferred by senators pages eight to seventeen which shows the extensive history from the beginning of the republican tilt t prayer in congress that would be sectarian and unconstitutional under respondents position with respect to coercion that it's unquestionably true but there is less argue less basis for claiming coersion here than there was in march in march senator chambers was required to be on the senate floor by rule he had to be there to do his job and he and the practice was to stand every single time which he did because he felt course to do it whereas here the record suggests there were three times when somebody requested people to stand out of one hundred twenty one occasions the idea that this is as more coercive than that march is absurd in march the court expression rejected a coersion argument saying we expect adults to be able to deal with this and with respect to the history as well i think the debate in the continental congress when this issue was first raised shows what the american tradition has been that is americans are not bigots and we can stand to hear a prayer delivered in a legislative form by someone whose views we don't agree with that is the tradition in this country and that is why it doesn't violate the establishment clause and finally with respect to the fact that this is a municipality rather than a state or local or federal government that can't possibly make a difference as an establishment clause matter it makes no sense to suggest that the that prayer at the local level is more dangerous for establishment clause purposes than what congress is doing only congress can establish a religion for the entire nation which is the the core preventative purpose of the establishment clause to suggest that there are greater restrictions on makes no sense at all we think that the dangerously overbroad theories advanced by respondents are at odds with our history and traditions which we reflect this tradition of tolerance for religious views that we don't agree with in the legislative context response there is also conflict with the religion clauses mandate that it's not the business of government to be regulating the content of prayer and faith and regulating theological orthodoxy thank you thank you counsel patience submitted