Newsgroup: it.politica.internazionale
Titolo: a proposito di pregiudizi socialmente accettabili

La Corte suprema USA è a maggioranza cattolica e conservatrice.
E si appresta a affrontare questioni come la separazione tra religione
e politica
http://www.americamagazine.org/content/article.cfm?article_id=10779
The Court at a Crossroads
A new majority enters the culture wars
By Antony Barone Kolenc | APRIL 28, 200
 A n atheist in California has again sued to remove the words “under
God” from the Pledge of Allegiance and “In God We Trust” from all U.S.
currency. A student in Vermont is suing her school for refusing to
recognize her Christian club. An Illinois high school freshman has
challenged her school’s “moment of silence.” And, of course, Christmas
2007 brought another spike in religion-related complaints—protests
about public school choirs singing religious songs and demands that
Nativity scenes be removed from outside town halls. Religion-based
lawsuits like these have continued to multiply in recent years.
As this most recent batch of cases works its way through the legal
system, however, those involved may find themselves before a Supreme
Court that is ready to redefine some of the controversial boundaries
between church and state. Big change may be coming in America’s
culture wars—a legal shift that could alter the so-called separation
between church and state. And a Roman Catholic majority on the United
States Supreme Court may be the driving force behind it.
A Catholic Majority
In the past 50 years, the nine justices on the U.S. Supreme Court have
struggled to solve divisive religious issues brought under the
Constitution’s First Amendment guarantee of freedom of religion. The
result? A confusing patchwork of legal mumbo jumbo. These cases—often
decided by a vote of 5 to 4—have limited how government is permitted
to recognize God. Justice Sandra Day O’Connor (a social moderate and
the first woman to serve on the court) often wielded that decisive
fifth, swing vote on matters of religion.
O’Connor is retired now, replaced by Samuel Alito, the fifth Catholic
justice on the present Supreme Court. Justice Alito has joined Anthony
Kennedy, Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas and Chief Justice John
Roberts to form the first Catholic majority in the court’s history.
Will this change the course of court decisions? These five justices
are likely to vote together, but not primarily because they share the
Catholic faith. Instead, they share a conservative judicial philosophy
that values the role of religion in our nation’s traditions and in its
moral foundation.
The Religion Issue
“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion.”
These first 10 words of the First Amendment—known as the establishment
clause—were placed in the Constitution by our founding fathers. What
do they mean?
The Jesuit Refugee Service
It is generally agreed that these words mean the federal government
cannot set up an official religion, as England had done with the
Anglican Church. Nor can the state coerce its citizens through
taxation or other laws to support any particular religion. But the
conservative justices argue further that our nation was built on faith
in a supreme being—a God whom the founders never intended to exclude
from public life.
The Declaration of Independence says our Creator endowed us with
certain inalienable rights, among these are “life, liberty and the
pursuit of happiness.” And John Adams, a founder and the second
president, noted, “Our Constitution was made only for a moral and
religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any
other.” To this end, the First Amendment gives religious Americans
preferential treatment: in the exercise of their religion, they are
specifically protected from government interference.
On the other hand, the four more liberal justices on the court view
the Constitution as a living document that has evolved from 18th-
century thought. In their view, modernity requires a stricter
separation between church and state, with very little (or no)
government involvement with religion. They fear that some Americans—
atheists and those practicing alternative religions—could be treated
as second-class citizens.
Scalia v. Kennedy
On today’s Supreme Court, Justice Antonin Scalia and Justice Anthony
Kennedy stand out, each for a different reason. Justice Scalia is
undoubtedly the most outspoken voice on establishment clause issues.
He has been a longtime critic of the court’s rulings, arguing for
greater tolerance of religion in the public arena. A persuasive
advocate, Scalia is often joined in his campaign by Roberts, Thomas
and Alito.
Justice Kennedy, on the other hand, has a special role to play: he is
the new swing vote on establishment clause issues. This means he will
usually be the decisive fifth vote that carries the day, one way or
the other. Although Kennedy is generally conservative on matters of
religion, he is less so than his fellow Catholics on the court.
Kennedy voted to uphold Roe v. Wade, which established abortion as a
fundamental right. He also authored the 2003 opinion that for the
first time recognized legal protections for homosexual persons.
Justice Scalia, on the other hand, voted opposite to Kennedy on both
issues.
The New ‘Coercion Test’
Changes in the area of church-state law will occur only to the extent
that Justice Kennedy and his swing vote allow. But we can expect
Kennedy to join the other four conservative justices in creating a
more practical, commonsense approach to matters of church and state.
Most significantly, the court is likely to abandon the controversial
“Lemon test,” a point of reference for deciding church-state
questions. This complicated three-part test has been widely criticized
as both ill-conceived and inconsistently applied.
In its place, expect to see a new judicial measuring rod—the “coercion
test.” Using this tool, the court will decide whether the state has
coerced its citizens to support or participate in any religion or
religious exercise. Though key constitutional protections will
continue even while the externals change, applying this simpler test
may result in striking changes from the current way the court views
some issues.
Of Commandments and Nativities
Most significant, the new majority may alter the rules governing
public displays, especially depictions of the Ten Commandments and
Nativity scenes at Christmas.
In recent years, monuments with the Ten Commandments inscribed on them
have been a flashpoint for litigation when set up on government
property. Activist groups have successfully challenged displays of the
commandments on courthouse walls and town squares. In 2005, the
Supreme Court put out a muddled batch of opinions on this matter, with
Justice O’Connor voting to remove the commandments from a courthouse
in Kentucky.
Now that Justice O’Connor has departed, however, expect to see future
decisions going the other way. Justice Kennedy will likely join the
other four conservative justices in permitting displays of the Ten
Commandments on public grounds. Such displays would be accepted as an
acknowledgment of religion’s contribution to American heritage. The
court could find that such exhibits do not coerce observers to
participate in any particular religion.
Would there be any limits on displaying the commandments? Certainly.
The court would still prevent them from being used by the government
to evangelize. For instance, a state will not be able to use the
commandments to advocate conversion to Christianity.
Another departure from precedent involves Christmas displays on public
grounds. This overly complicated area of the law is due for an
overhaul. Under the current rules, government offices are severely
limited in how they set up decorations, such as the Christian Nativity
or the Jewish menorah. Displays now need to be watered down, for
instance, so that no one will think the government is sending a
religious message. This typically means that the baby Jesus is
surrounded by Santa Claus, “holiday” trees and the like, to avoid
appearing in any way to endorse Christianity. As Justice Kennedy has
written, rules like this unfairly punish majority religions by giving
them “the status of least favored faiths so as to avoid any possible
risk of offending members of minority religions.”
But under the “coercion test,” this hypersensitive policy may go the
way of the dinosaur. In future cases, the court will decide whether
such displays coerce people to participate in religious exercise. The
justices could rule that erecting a crèche at Christmas is not coercive
—it simply recognizes the importance of the Nativity to a traditional
national holiday.
So those endless December complaints about religious symbols may now
be short-circuited by the Supreme Court. Christ may be permitted back
in Christmas—even in the public square or high school choir.
Restoring Equality
Sometimes public schools are unnecessarily concerned about allowing
religious student clubs. Principals are afraid of improperly endorsing
religion. But this fear is not well founded.
In a series of equal rights cases, the court has ruled that both
religious and secular groups should have the same access to public
facilities. To forbid equal access would be to discriminate simply
because of a group’s religious identity. For the same reason,
religious organizations are permitted to accept generally available
public financial aid.
Under the new majority, these rules will be continued and possibly
enhanced. For example, the court has already turned back one challenge
to President George W. Bush’s faith-based initiatives program, which
permits aid to religious groups performing secular work, like helping
the homeless. This and similar programs will survive under the
coercion test.
What does all this mean? In practical terms, the Vermont student whose
Christian club was rejected by her high school has a strong chance of
prevailing in her case.
State-Sponsored Prayer
Another controversial issue involves official prayer, especially in a
public school setting. The courts have previously rejected prayer and
moments of silence in schools, believing them to be endorsements of
religion among the “impressionable young.”
Outside the school setting, however, the Supreme Court has shown
tolerance for nonsectarian prayer by government officials. The court
has allowed legislators, for instance, to start their sessions with
official prayer, as they have done for centuries. Justice Scalia in
particular has noted the longstanding American tradition “to
acknowledge and beseech the blessing of God as a people, and not just
as individuals.” The new majority will likely continue to permit such
prayers by officials, as long as no coercion occurs.
But what of the Illinois student’s challenge to her school’s moment of
silence? It is unclear whether the court will now allow such in-school
periods of reflection. In past cases, Justice Kennedy has voted to
strike down laws that bring prayer into public schools. He views
school activities as obligatory and subtly coercive because of peer
pressure on students to conform. Justice Scalia disagrees, arguing
that “speech is not coercive; the listener may do as he likes.” In the
end, the fate of moments of silence may depend on whether Justice
Kennedy views the policy as sanctioning official prayer in school.
One thing is virtually certain: the California atheist’s attempts to
strike the words “under God” and “In God We Trust” from American
public life will fail. Neither Kennedy nor the other conservative
justices seem to think these words are coercive or a form of prayer.
Indeed, the court will likely affirm the government’s recognition of
our country’s long-held traditions and the role of religion in
developing America into a great nation.
A Matter of Time
What will the future bring? One or two liberal justices may retire
during the next presidency, specifically Justices Stevens and
Ginsburg. But it remains to be seen whether the conservative majority
will gain more like-minded members on the court. That will depend on
the new president and Senate that emerge from the 2008 elections.
Even if the five Catholics stand alone, however, expect some
groundbreaking decisions on a host of religious issues over the next
few years. In addition to the issues discussed so far, the court may
hear challenges to private school voucher programs and to teaching
alternatives to the theory of evolution, among other divisive topics.
As these cases wind their way through the lower courts, it is only a
matter of time before the new conservative majority on the Supreme
Court flexes its muscles.
http://www.americamagazine.org/content/article.cfm?article_id=10779

La Corte suprema USA è a maggioranza cattolica e conservatrice.
Infatti è quella che ha ridichiarato la pena di morte legale
In ottemperanza al famoso articolo del catechismo
A

 A
Già, quello che un noto broccolo usenettico (che gira sempre in 
compagnia di due evangeliche bestie) ritiene si riferisca alla 
"legittima difesa" dello Stato contro il criminale :)
Dan

Redfiddler <cacci...@NOSPAMlibero.it> wrote:

Premesso che aborro la pena di morte, non credo sia proprio così.
Per quanto ne ho letto, la Corte ha negato che l'esecuzione tramite
iniezione letale sia un metodo "disumano" e particolarmente afflittivo
per il condannato.
In pratica non decideva *il se*, ma *il come*.
Quanto alla Chiesa, ancora oggi l'insegnamento tradizionale della Chiesa
non esclude, supposto il pieno accertamento dell'identità e della
responsabilità del colpevole, il ricorso alla pena di morte, quando
questa fosse l'unica via praticabile per difendere efficacemente
dall'aggressore ingiusto la vita di esseri umani (Giovanni Paolo II,
Evangelium Vitae).
Forse se il papa polacco avesse preso una posizione più netta in
contrasto alla pena di morte i parrucconi bigotti Giudici Americani
avrebbero trovato la maniera di espungere dall'ordinamento questa
tremenda, inutile ed anacronistica pena.
-- 
Davide  

 ha scritto nel messaggio 
news:481ad5af$0$35956$4faf...@reader2.news.tin.it...

chi è costui?
A