Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/21pdf/20-1800_7lho.pdf
Page Number: 43.0

8 

SHURTLEFF v. BOSTON 

 GORSUCH, J., concurring
GORSUCH, J., concurring in judgment 

Recognizing Lemon’s flaws, this Court has not applied its
test for nearly two decades.  In Town of Greece v. Galloway, 
this Court declined an invitation to use the Lemon test.  See 
572 U. S. 565, 577 (2014); Brief for Respondents in Town of 
Greece v. Galloway, O. T. 2013, No. 12–696, pp. 58–60.  In-
stead, the Court explained that the primary question in Es-
tablishment Clause cases is whether the government’s con-
duct  “accords  with  history  and  faithfully  reflects  the 
understanding of the Founding Fathers.”  572 U. S., at 577 
(internal  quotation  marks  omitted).    The  Court  observed 
that this form of analysis represents the rule rather than
“an exception” within the “Court’s Establishment Clause ju-
risprudence.”    Id.,  at  575–577  (internal  quotation  marks 
omitted).

In  American  Legion  v.  American  Humanist  Association 
we underscored the message.  588 U. S. ___, ___ (2019) (plu-
rality opinion) (slip op., at 25).  Again we expressly refused
to  apply  Lemon,  this  time  in  a  challenge  to  a  public  dis-
play—the  very  kind  of  dispute  Lemon’s  test  ushered  into 
existence and where it once held sway.  588 U. S., at ___– 
___ (slip op., at 13–16).  Again we explained that “[i]f the 
Lemon Court thought that its test would provide a frame-
work for all future Establishment Clause decisions, its ex-
pectation has not been met.”10  Id., at ___ (slip op., at 13). 

—————— 
(O’Connor, J., concurring in part and concurring in judgment); Commit-
tee  for  Public  Ed.  and  Religious  Liberty  v.  Regan,  444  U. S.  646,  671 
(1980) (Stevens, J., dissenting) (disparaging “the sisyphean task of trying
to patch together the ‘blurred, indistinct, and variable barrier’ described 
in Lemon”).

10 See also American Legion, 588 U. S., at ___ (THOMAS, J., concurring 
in judgment) (slip op., at 7) (“[B]ecause the Lemon test is not good law, 
we ought to say so”); id., at ___ (GORSUCH, J., concurring in judgment) 
(slip op., at 7) (“Lemon was a misadventure.  It sought a ‘grand unified
theory’ of the Establishment Clause but left us only a mess”); id., at ___ 
(KAVANAUGH, J., concurring) (slip op., at 1) (“As this case again demon-
strates, this Court no longer applies the old test articulated in Lemon”).